advanced passenger info (api) and LHR terminal 4 merging with terminal 3
Is the new API for ba flights only or all airlines? There is a passport and visa check desk at terminal 3 which has not been manned for ages...are they doing checks now?
Location: Portland OR Double Emerald (QF and AA), DL PM/MM, Starwood Plat
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It is a US gov't requirement so all airlines operating flights into US are affected equally. Rollout is underway so there may be slight differences which become identical when completed. Oneworld airlines operating out of T4 have now moved to T3 (as of last week). Other airlines (Skyteam?) will be using T4. Passport and visa checks have always been done at all LHR terminals if you are entering the UK, but not for international transit (however there is a security check for transit). Nothing has changed.
So if I have a flight dublin-transit LHR-Lax I will only have to go through security?
Also I have been flying in and out of the UK and noticed that exit control desks that check passports have not been manned (especially at terminal 3) for ages. However BA has merged some flights from terminal 4 to terminal 3 and in addition completely renovated terminal 3 and according to their website http://www.ba-sbc.com/be/all-news/ne...movebkksinsyd/ these desks are now manned...does anyone know if this is true?
So if I have a flight dublin-transit LHR-Lax I will only have to go through security?
That depends. When you're leaving the UK, you're leaving the Common Travel Area (i.e. Ireland—UK flights are not treated as fully international), and so there might be passport checks even though you're just in transit (and see below).
Quote:
Originally Posted by lililondon
Also I have been flying in and out of the UK and noticed that exit control desks that check passports have not been manned (especially at terminal 3) for ages. However BA has merged some flights from terminal 4 to terminal 3 and in addition completely renovated terminal 3 and according to their website http://www.ba-sbc.com/be/all-news/ne...movebkksinsyd/ these desks are now manned...does anyone know if this is true?
Certainly when I passed through Terminal 3 at the beginning of October the exit passport control desks were in use. Over the past year they sometimes have been and sometimes not. The government's stated plan is that exit passport control will be re-established as the norm everywhere, so (assuming that is still the plan) it is likely that they will be in operation more and more.
It is a US gov't requirement so all airlines operating flights into US are affected equally. Rollout is underway so there may be slight differences which become identical when completed. Oneworld airlines operating out of T4 have now moved to T3 (as of last week). Other airlines (Skyteam?) will be using T4. Passport and visa checks have always been done at all LHR terminals if you are entering the UK, but not for international transit (however there is a security check for transit). Nothing has changed.
The UK government has an API requirement too, so API compliances comes into play for more than all airlines operating flights into the US.
This certainly isn't just a BA thing or even just a US government thing -- in this situation it's first and foremost a UK government thing being pushed on all airlines flying to/from the UK.
And just for the sake of clarification, I doubt that the collection of advance passenger information has a one-to-one relationship with the presence of exit passport control anyway.
