A TikTok video suggesting airline passengers can skip queues by pretending to need a wheelchair has been slammed by an airport boss.
John Holland-Kaye, Chief Executive of Heathrow, urged passengers not to copy the 'travel hack', describing it as "absolutely the wrong thing to be doing." Speaking to LBC, he said: “For passengers requiring wheelchair support we have more demand than we had before the pandemic.
“Some of this is because people are using wheelchair support to try to get fast-tracked through the airport. That is absolutely the wrong thing to be doing.
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"If you go on TikTok you’ll see that is one of the travel hacks that people are recommending. Please don’t do that. We need to protect that for the people who most need help."
A video showing a passenger skipping queues by faking injury to get a wheelchair at Ibiza Airport, Spain, has been viewed 2.5 million times on the video sharing app. At the end of the flight, the man is shown standing up and walking away.
Mr Holland-Kaye added that about half of arriving passengers who request assistance only do so once they are on the plane. He urged people who “really need the service” to let Heathrow know “well in advance so [they] can make sure there are enough people there to meet your needs”.
Many travellers using the airport this summer have faced long queues, with the situation blamed on staff shortages. A cap on daily departing passenger numbers was introduced earlier this month to ease the pressure.
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