anacapamalibu

Here's a 12 minute video arrival @Beijing Capital Airport basically just follow
the people...only one way out.

BuildingMyBento

I haven't seen those collected since the H5N1 days (well, when it was more of a panic anyway) a few years ago. ALWAYS forgot about them, even though I lived in Shenzhen and went to Hong Kong often at the time. Made of the flimsiest stock too.

But I do still see temperature checks at airports, before hitting immigration.

Scifience

They may be there and even be staffed, but at least in my experience, nobody is paying attention. I've walked through at least twice with a decently high fever (39C or so) to absolutely no reaction.

anacapamalibu

Thermal imaging cameras/monitors don't have to be continuously monitored.
A "beep" or alert will be issued and an image captured.

celestialbound

Thanks so much for all the detailed replies to my post. Very helpful.

xooz

You didn't say where you would be staying, but if you are taking a taxi to your hotel, be sure you bring something printed with the address of the hotel in Chinese. You would need the phone number of the hotel as well, since the taxi drivers I have had invariably don't know where any hotel is. The taxi drivers will speak no English.

In most cases, a taxi from the airport directly to your hotel will be more effective than trying to take the train from the airport, especially if it is your first time.

milepig

Sort of bumping an old thread...

On the scale of ease of passage and questioning, where does PEK fall?

I'm a very experienced traveler, but never to China. I've seen everything from "don't even open the passport" (AMS) to sort of glance at it but don't stamp it" (FCO) to flip through a little bit and then stamp but no questions (must of Europe) to being downright helpful (NRT) to a million random questions (LHR).

Ditto customs, do most people just walk straight through? You read horror stories of closely examining books and asking about paperwork, etc., but how common is that.

If it matters, we're traveling with tourist visas for leisure, staying about 6 days, and arriving from the US via Japan and Korea. We have newly-minted 10 year multi-entry visas.

Loren Pechtel

I can't address PEK customs as I've only been through there domestically. However, we have been through immigration/customs at SHA/PVG probably a couple dozen times by now. Immigration has always been hand over the passport and arrival card, I can't recall ever being asked a question but at times there has been a little conversation between the official and my wife. (She's a native speaker as they would know from her passport.) I would call it typical for the first world. Customs has only looked at us once--and that was when I (momentarily separated from my wife) was wheeling out a cart of 4 suitcases + no carry-ons. My passport showing entry 2 days earlier upped his spidey-sense. He ran the bags through his x-ray at which point my wife showed up and explained the airline left our bags behind, we were picking them up. End of inspection, nothing was opened. Also, one time my wife managed to set off a nuke alarm in the green line at customs--and nobody responded. (And earlier when she set off a manned nuke alarm they quickly resolved it entirely by talking despite the fact she had managed to leave the card from the lab at home. I was surprised at that, they made no effort to actually figure out the source of the radiation. A geiger counter would quickly determine whether it was her or her stuff and whether it was a whole-body source or a point source--but none was used.)

PTravel

Though it's been a couple of years since I've been there, I've flown into PEK a lot. They look at the passport, check for your visa, scan the first page into their computer and sometimes look at you. It's fast and efficient. There are also three little buttons you can press to rate your experience. I always press the "excellent" button (or whatever it was called), and usually get a "thank you" from the immigration officer. I've never once been stopped by customs for inspection.

JPDM

They don't talk to you, ask any question. They look at your passport, scan it, stamp it and will point you to look at the camera. As simple as it gets.
Depending on your terminal, you may have to take a short train ride to luggage claim.
When exiting through customs, take the green channel (nothing to declare).

anacapamalibu

Camera verifies biometric facial recognition on e-passport presented.

Have read that all Chinese passports contain biometric data including
facial recognition and fingerprints. Every entry point to PEK has cameras,
so anyone entering, who have a Chinese passport, are automatically IDed.
Probably wouldn't work with one of those polution masks on.

mosburger

China immigration is much friendlier than for example Japan or Korea. Nothing to complain about especially compared to the TSA goons.

Loren Pechtel

I'll definitely second this. Chinese airport security is much friendlier than the TSA.

PTravel

Absolutely. That's true of arrival and departure.