Holidaymakers crossing the Channel are facing travel disruption just one day after the school year finished for thousands of pupils.

People using the Port of Dover are facing delays of at least one hour as they head to France today from the Kent coast, with yesterday’s IT failure causing more people to use the port.

Kent County Council (KCC) has warned: “If your start to the summer holidays has been impacted by the IT #outage and you're thinking of swapping a plane for a Channel crossing, both the ferries out of #Dover and Le Shuttle are not taking turn up passengers today. Please make a booking before heading to the port.”

A spokesperson for Port of Dover said: "There is currently a 60-minute wait time at the Buffer zone.

"We appreciate your patience as we work hard to process the traffic – thank you.”

They continued: “We are seeing hundreds of displaced airport passengers arriving at the Port, please ensure you have a booking before arrival.”

Meanwhile, DFDS ferry service is reporting delays of up to two hours at Dover.

The delays come less than 24 hours after many pupils broke up for the holidays for the next six weeks.

With temperatures also hitting up to 30C, it means a huge spike in vehicles is expected on the roads this weekend.

Yet the port’s buffer area, which holds waiting traffic, is to already have less room because of construction work for the new Entry/Exit System (EES) border checks which begin in October.

Bosses already announced earlier this month processing times inside the port could therefore take up to two hours between 6am and 1pm on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays during the summer holiday.

Cross-Channel traffic is also set to increase by almost a third again in the coming weeks because of the Paris Olympics beginning on Friday (July 26).

Port of Dover chief executive Doug Bannister says plans are in place to prevent major disruption.

He explained: “We must factor in an anticipated increase in traveller numbers of 30%, who will be making their way to Paris for the Olympic Games.

”We have the added challenge of having to implement our infrastructure works required by France and the EU to support the EU’s new EES due to go live in October.

“On arrival at the port this summer, our customers will see the contractors we have on-site, working around an already busy 24/7 operation to construct these facilities.

“The effect of these works that are required to house the process means that our buffer zone, where traffic waits for French border clearance, will have a reduced capacity.

“We have added in as much capacity as we can to compensate, but we are advising those who will be using the port this summer that it will be exceptionally busy.”

A global IT outage affecting computer systems across the board also resulted in unhappy passengers yesterday (July 19).

This is alongside the return of Operation Brock on the M20.

The contraflow scheme, which sees lorries heading to the continent queue on the coastbound side between Junction 8 for Leeds Castle and 9 for Ashford, was redeployed earlier this month and is expected to remain in place until mid-August.

Dover TAP is also in place with one lane closed on A20.

A Port of Dover spokesperson told KentOnline: “The Port is processing tourist traffic well, and according to plan on this busy summer getaway weekend with the current border processing time of 60 minutes upon arrival.”