Reader Question: Can I Use Landside Priority Pass Lounges While Not Flying?

Today we have a Reader Question concerning Priority Pass Lounges that are located landside and if it’s possible to visit these lounges when not flying the day of the visit.

Readers are encouraged to send us questions, comments, or opinions by email, Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. We’ll try to cover them here several times a week.

Airport lounges are typically located behind the security checkpoints, commonly referred to as “airside”, but every so often you come across airports where there are lounges located in the public area which we call “landside”.

An example of such lounges would be the Premium VIP Lounge at Barcelona Terminal 1, the Luxx Lounge in Frankfurt, or the KIX Airport Cafe Lounge in Osaka, among others.

In an email I received this week, Werner asks:

Hi Sebastian, one question about the Priority Pass from American Express.

I’m quite often at airports for meetings (I work part-time as a courier and have to wait for people at the Terminal) and was wondering if I can use the pass for participating lounges accessible in the public area.

Obviously, I wouldn’t have a boarding pass, so I was wondering if they’d simply accept the card and let me in.

This would save me quite a bit of money over the year that I don’t have to spend at expensive airport cafes and restaurants.

To start it off, there aren’t a lot of landside lounges to begin with. Once in a blue moon, you come across one, but that’s absolutely not the norm.

That being said, I had a variety of experiences accessing these facilities. Best example with the most number of entries is probably the (awful) Luxx Lounge in Frankfurt.

Whenever I entered, they only wanted to see the Priority Pass. I was asked maybe a handful of times out of fifty visits to also show them a boarding pass. They then simply scanned it if I had one, and never complained, even if it’s an arriving flight or one that arrived 1-2 days ago. I also said before that my check-in isn’t open yet which was the reason for my visit. Never an issue.

This lounge used to be rather nice when it was an Admirals Club but after it changed to a Priority Pass lounge, it deteriorated more and more.

When I used the ReLAX Lounge that used to exist at LAX Airport or the Plaza Premium Arrivals Lounge in Helsinki, I was never asked for the boarding pass either. Maybe it’s enough if you give them a flight number if they insist?

There doesn’t seem to be a universal rule for these lounge as far as being an actual passenger unless it’s specifically mentioned in the app or on the website.

The KIX Aeroplaza Cafe, for example, states that you have to be “a traveler with a same-day boarding pass” in order to gain access. None of the other lounges I checked had this language in the description.

Conclusion

Holders of a Priority Pass can visit lounges that are located outside the secure area at certain airports. The exact locations are available in the registry which is available as a paper booklet, via the app or on the website.

One of our readers asked if he could use those even when not actually traveling by air that particular day. For example, while visiting the airport for some reason or after arrival.

Based on personal experience and after looking at the access policy language, I can say this is not a problem in most cases. There are locations that require a same-day boarding pass, but those are the exception rather than the rule. Keep in mind that this is for LANDSIDE lounges in the public area. So far, all lounges in the departure gate area always wanted to see a boarding pass, but you’d have one anyway at these locations, how else would you gain access to the gates !?

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