East Midlands Airport Reviews 

5,306
TrustScore 2 out of 5

1.8

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Review summary

Created with AI, based on recent reviews

Looking at 75 reviews, most reviewers were unhappy with their experience overall. Travelers frequently complained about expensive drop-off fees and confusing online payment systems that easily resulted in unexpected penalty charges for motorists. Many customers also mentioned enduring frustratingly long security queues and dealing with exceptionally high prices for basic food and beverages. People expressed deep frustration regarding the lack of clear signage and perceived difficulties when trying to appeal unfair fines. Some reviewers were happy with the friendly staff members encountered throughout the terminal during their journey. A small group of passengers also appreciated the efficient meet and greet parking options and quick passage through passport control.

What people talk about most

Location

People report ambiguous experiences with location, noting that reviewers frequently praise the convenience of... See more

Service

Clients share ambiguous opinions on service, with some reviewers praising the meet and greet staff as helpful... See more

Price

Consumers express deep frustration with the pricing, frequently describing fees as excessively high.... See more

Staff

Users describe ambiguous interactions with staff, as experiences vary significantly. While many reviewers... See more

Payment

Reviewers highlight negative aspects of payment due to the frustrating online-only system that lacks on-site... See more

Reviews shaping this summary

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

Regular flyers from ema,just wanted 2 coffees from starbucks before flight as early start.Two regular americanos almost £10-had a gift card told not accepted as it was a private franchise at airport?... See more

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

Well last year travelling to Croatia we went two days without luggage thanks to their conveyor belt breaking. This year after arriving back from Gran Canaria we walked off the plane through to UK Bor... See more

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Drop off cost. My driver paid the short term parking charge with payment evidenced but we still got pursued for £170 non-payment fee. Impossible to contact the APCOA Parking Company or their licensed... See more

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Terrible organisation... 3 planes landing at 1am... they have all day, why not organise them 30mins apart. Queues through passport control takes forever due to every plane arriving at once. Absolute j... See more


1.8

Poor

TrustScore 2 out of 5

5k reviews

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1.8

All reviews

(5,306)

73 reviews in the last 12 months

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Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Rapid drop off is an absolute scam…

Rapid drop off is an absolute scam there was no where too pay and barriers were syull there in October I seen nothing about paying online which ive read from previous complaints and now have too pay 170 !

6 October 2025
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Rapid drop off parking predators

Used the rapid drop off at East Midlands twice over the Easter weekend. They don’t allow you to actually pay on site, but you need to leave (via barrierless exit), allow your car to be registered arriving and departing and then pay before online or by phone by midnight the following day.

They know damn well that people will forget.. and yes I was one of them. Dropped family off on 3rd April and remembered to pay later that night (£5). Picked them up on the 7th April, and annoyingly forgot to pay until a couple of days later … when it was too late (went online, but no option to pay for anything other than that day, or the day before) … and before I knew it, a £60 parking fine popped through the letterbox … for 7 minutes of parking.

Why not give the option to pay when leaving? Oh, that’s right, it won’t generate all the additional revenue via its horrific parking fines. Would love to know how much additional revenue EMA are generating from their new payment system via APCOA.

Will happily never visit that airport again.

7 April 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

'Good Luck' if you try to call them by phone

If you are trying to contact East Midland Airport by phone, it is virtually impossible to speak to anybody. The system takes you round and round in circles either referring you to their Website then if you then continue as you have tried the Website with no luck it eventually sends you round and round again then cuts you off. I have booked a parking space and when going to the confirmation email and click on find my booking it states "Sorry we either couldn't find your booking or your booking cannot be managed on this site". I have eventually got through and now been told that if it was booked over the phone (Blue Badge) it will not recognise the booking on line, you have to call again to change anything!!!!!!

15 April 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 4 out of 5 stars

Birmingham Airport / Station shuttle

Arrived by train to Birmingham International. Shuttle Metro to airport OK, but obviously far too small / short now. Like most airports is more or less a building site, which brings trouble e.g. temporary toilets. But overall OK

12 April 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

A legalised scam

A legalised scam. I only wish I could score it less than 0. Go to pick someone up and you are forced into lanes against your will. You park for less than five minutes and because of poor signage you don't know that the payment system has changed. There is no clarity that you have to pay, how or where you pay (online) and then the cost of not knowing that you have to pay by midnight is £60 minimum. There is no incentive for them improving this system

2 April 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Meet & Greet Car Parking - AVOID!!

Meet & Greet Car Parking - a good idea - NOT! Wasn’t cheap for sure but seemed like a convenient choice! Bad call…my car was damaged during it’s stay…and they just don’t want to know!!

Having to request scans/cctv footage myself from 3rd party companies and handle through my own insurance company!!! Unhelpful to the ‘nth?’

Haven’t used this airport in a good while - will never use again!

25 March 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 2 out of 5 stars

Disappointing duty free for experience …

Disappointing duty free for experience - I know East Midlands is a small airport but the shopping experience is really naff. There used to be some lovely duty shops including Boots but they have all disappeared. All you have is Accessorize, J D Sports and W H smiths along with the normal duty free perfume and tobacco/alcohol ….. quite a few eateries - altogether a very disappointing experience considering that the airport have spent millions upgrading the facilities!

14 March 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Rapid Rip off parking

Drop off parking is a total money making scam. Do not use this rip off airport and certainly don’t use rapid drop off. It should be renamed as rapid rip off.

7 February 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 3 out of 5 stars

Unacceptable Not Fit For Purpose Rough Pavement Impossible to Wheel cases on from Mid stay 1 to Departures!

We flew out on 22nd January & parked in mid stay 1 as it’s quite near Departures. We bought super glide 8 wheel suitcases to make life easier as I am walking disabled & my husband & I had a large case & a cabin sized case each. We found mid stay 1 easy enough but the surface had lumps of loose gravel but nothing prepared us for the path to departures which had rough & uneven tarmac like the top coat had been skinned off! A 5 minute walk took us 15 mins in the pouring rain trying to half lift & half drag our cases over a totally unfit for purpose surface causing great distress & severe painful stress on my joints ! The new cases wheels have taken a battering & we’re almost ripped off trying to roll then again not acceptable! My poor hubby had to keep lifting his cases & coming back to mine to help lift them! Surely the Airport has a “ duty of care” to rectify this path? Totally unacceptable & I have emailed in a formal complaint twice with photos twice & I am being fobbed off unceremoniously! Disgusting & perhaps worth a chat with the local newspapers

22 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Terrible drop-off experience for a disabled person when picking up or returning rental car.Terrible drop-off experience for a…

Arrived to find that despite being told car rentals were based at the terminal and had a shuttle bus, They’re not close; they’re several hundred yards away, and the shuttle bus doesn’t run from January to April. I had to leave my disabled wife at the terminal while I slowly walked to collect the car. After the car collection, I drove back and stopped briefly beside the terminal on the service road to pick her up, then drove on. Upon the return of the car, I followed the signs for rental car return, and again had nowhere to drop her near the terminal, so I pulled in for 1 min to let her out at bus stop near the terminal (no buses coming of course), then drove on to return the car. - I was of course fined both times for stopping briefly. I have since read about the rapid drop-off area, which surely should be free of charge for anyone dropping a passenger (especially disabled), from a rental car based at that same airport, ESPECIALLY when the airport has chosen not to run the shuttle bus for three months. - This is a scam. The fact that had I used the rapid drop off I would also have to remember a rental cars number plate to be able to pay online within a day after I got home, is also unrealistic - it isn't my car, and my online receipt from the rental agency doesn't have its registration number (which is required to pay the rapid drop off fee). Awful, Awful, Awful, and should be investigated under the consumer protection act, as well as looking at their treatment of disabled people using their facilities.

1 February 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Meet and Greet

We would like to say a big “Thank You” to the Green Watch at the Meet and Greet parking. The team were veryhelpful and kind in a difficult situation. Your employers should be proud to have you all on their team.
Sally and Ray White

6 February 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Parking scam

Booked parking through Ryanair only to find it can't be cancelled even 4 weeks in advance, despite it being able to be cancelled up to 72 hours in advance if booked elsewhere. This feels incredibly unfair!

3 February 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

What a shambles!

What a shambles!

We travelled on a 5.15 flight from the airport in January to Malaga,
The door to the security and check in was closed until 2 hours prior to our flight meaning that we couldn’t access anywhere other than the SHED of a check in area and get warm until then.
Upon collection from the airport we were picked up by a relative who used the rapid drop off collection lane.
On exit the barrier was up and so it was assumed that there was no charge for the 10 minutes parking fee.
The relative has now received a parking a fine for parking contravention for £50.00 which we will contest.
The whole airport is a glorified shed.

17 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Road signage to and from the airport is…

Road signage to and from the airport is terrible. I nearly always end up in the Services area on the way to the passenger terminal and end up taking the wrong exit on leaving the airport e.g. M1 South instead of M1 North. Poor lighting all around the site, confusing signage which is not large enough to see in bad weather.
Airport itself is however very good with great facilities - pity about getting to it.

21 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

No buses to car rental at east mids airport

Arrived on Friday and all buses from airport to car rental center do NOT run during off peak months. I was told it's a 20 minute walk which may be ok for young people but when your wife is disabled and you also have issues walking. Not very good from a disability viewpoint fortunately we managed to get a lift to the car rental center and on the way back today had to get an Uber costing £8.
Have to say this is not good enough from East Midlands airport, they need to have at least a shuttle bus or make people aware before booking a flight or car hire at the airport

17 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

A charge to retrieve from lost and found.

My wife left her hand bag in one of the toilets at EMA. She realised within 5 minutes, went back into the toilet but it was not there. Immediately she informed an airport representative who advised her it had not as yet been handed in. Luckily there were no essential travel documents in the bag so we were able to continue our journey being advised to contact EMA later via their website. The lost and found on the site appears to be outsourced and charges a minimum of 40 euros to retrieve an item! How on earth can this be justified? Is this EMA's idea of customer service? Please, someone explain this to me.

2 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Absolutely disgusting how we have been…

Absolutely disgusting how we have been treated here 2day they are useless after 10 mins of snow don’t no what they are doing and jet2 are discusting how they think they can treat customers these company’s need to be reported and put on news disable peaple on plane hours offered warm water

2 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Once again east midlands airport rapid…

Once again east midlands airport rapid drop has robbed me again. Now they have decided to remove the pay point from the rapid drop and make it a pay on line . So of course people will forget to call or log in to pay there £5 AND get a lovely £60 fine ,at least. This is nothing but extortion, praying on people who just want to drop of there loved ones. Shame on you and shame on Your parking bandit partners

1 January 2026
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Sat on a jet 2 plane for over an hour…

Sat on a jet 2 plane for over an hour and half on the runway because East Midlands air traffic control closed and the pilot is unable to contact anyone in air traffic control. Should have taken off at 9.45am but informed by air traffic control no because they are closing for a hour. Why schedule flights if you know you are going to close for whatever reason and then have poor communication and unable to speak to anyone especially on New Year’s Eve!

31 December 2025
Unprompted review

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