Depends, you have a sample size of the 10 minutes you where actually in the customs hall. All large IT systems have problems, it's the nature of IT and the reason why GOOD IT people are so expensive, keeping 1 computer running = pretty easy, keeping an entire network of them running = hard.
It's a little strange that the please activate message was still been shown, however there is a variety of reasons why a machine can be unactivated without it being a licensing issue, a machine can become unactivated if a piece of hardware is swapped out, since activation actually includes serial numbers of pieces of hardware in the activation code and change out certainly pieces of hardware (eg after a hardware failure) can easily mean the machine requires reactivation. Assuming that it was because of hardware failure, there is no guarentee that a technician whom does hardware swaps actually has local administrator rights to log in and reactivate a machine, or that the machine actually has internet access to allow activation to happen. If they have automatic activation, that happens after 3 days, not immediately, and yes it does bring up messages during that 3 day period.
This is not to defend customs IT dept, we all know that they are hardly perfect, but I also think some people have unrealistic expectations of IT equipment.