Originally Posted by
aspex
This makes no sense. You guys have our boarding passes in your hands. Both before the WTMD and after. How is it you do not know the pax is not travelling internationally? Something doesn't smell right here.
There are only a few airports in the country that have large scale international flight operations. My own airport is, technically, an international airport. Even so, pax need to connect through another US airport for most international destinations.
Originally Posted by
tsadude1
Sorry that you would such a hard time believing that this could happen but I have encountered this twice in the passed year. One individual actually had a physical altercation with a police officer. Happens all the time to elderly parents, the children ship the parents off to another relative when they no longer can deal with them. Talk about values, its not the BDOs who are dropping these folks off at the curb and then driving off. More often than not BDOs can calm people down and reduce a pax stress level.
I, too, have seen a lot of passengers at the airport who don't really have the help they need to navigate air travel, although I don't know the intentions of those who dropped them off. I generally just try to offer as much help as they are willing to accept, and try to make sure they get on their flight without trouble.
I can also say that most pax are calmer and less stressed after I speak with them, even those who told me that they have psychological disorders which make air travel stressful for them.
Originally Posted by
Scubatooth
So what your saying is that I have to follow a secret set of rules and laws that I cant look at, so i have no clue as to whats allowed or not, so i dont get a secondary haraSSSSment. Wow I cant wait till that is challenged in court as thats not gonna/shouldn't stand up at all, as these policies are like that of Stalin Russia era, not modern day
Whatever the crack the SOP makers are smoking they need to lay off as they have smoked themselves stupid. oh wait they have been this way since the start, and only gotten worse.
The official line:
http://www.tsa.gov/approach/unpredictability.shtm
Translation: If we tell you what to do to avoid SSSS, we also tell the terrorists what to do to avoid SSSS.
Also:
http://www.tsa.gov/what_we_do/layers/bdo/index.shtm
"BDOs add an element of unpredictability to the security screening process that is easy for passengers to navigate but difficult for terrorists to manipulate."
I also recall SPOT being called a "risk based random screening element" or some such thing, but I can't seem to find the reference right now.
Basically, it seems that TSA does not want people to have an easy, foolproof way to avoid any and all additional screening. This would constitute a security vulnerability which the terrorists could exploit.
Of course, this is my opinion only, not the official stance of TSA. I look forward to reading about the court challenge.
Originally Posted by
polonius
What if someone refused to STOP talking to a BDO? Such as for example you approach a passenger, engage them in some small talk about where they are going, what they are doing, etc. and you decide they are harmless and want to move on, but they, for example, decide this is a good opportunity to explain to you all the ways the TSA has ruined air travel. Or maybe just take the opportunity to share with you some of the amazing changes that have come into their lives since they accepted Jesus as their personal saviour? How would that work?
Happens all the time, especially the one about the ways TSA has ruined their air travel. Usually I politely tell them, "I'm sorry, but I really have to get back to my other duties. Thank you for sharing with me." Then, I walk away.
Originally Posted by
pmocek
...Thanks for the pointers, Spotnik, but what I and many others are looking for is not a pile of tips, general guidelines, clues, press releases, and internally-inconsistent and incomplete Web pages, but a list of all the rules we are required by your agency to follow if we wish to avoid having our freedom of movement restricted by that agency.
We have
repeatedly requested this information in comments at the TSA blog, yet no one answers.
How can we be expected to follow TSA's rules if we cannot read them? Are we expected to simply guess what is required of us based on all the often-inconsistent and clearly-incomplete information we are able to gather from anonymous tipsters, TSA press releases, and out-of-date TSA Web pages, then wait for some security guard to tell us whether we guessed correctly or not?
Again, I have not been able to find such a document. I could give you all the tips I have on how things are
supposed to work. I could give you advice on how to keep screeners from trying to bully you or pull a power trip. I could give you educated guesses on what official rules and regulations are relevant. You, however, have not asked for these things.
I am here because I think TSA needs more transparency. I
am trying to provide useful and accurate information, as someone who interacts with this information on a daily basis. I do not, however, have enough pull with the agency to make them create a clear, unambiguous list of the rules and regulations that apply to security screening for air travel. If I were in Mr. Hawley's position, that would be among my top priorities. I am not in Mr. Hawley's position.
Originally Posted by
chollie
Yes, and if this happens I will be told that I am not being "SSSSed for ignoring a BDO" (ie, refusing to converse with the BDO). I will be told that I am being SSSSed because of the 'secret criteria'.
When this happens, start with the TSA civil rights office:
http://www.tsa.gov/what_we_do/civilr...travelers.shtm
TSA civil rights policy:
http://www.tsa.gov/assets/pdf/civil_rights_policy.pdf
Originally Posted by
chollie
This really makes me see red. Alleged TSO's repeatedly post snarky comments in the blog along the lines of "if you idiots would just read the TSA rules online BEFORE you got to the airport, you'd save yourself all the hassle."
Uh...that's part of the problem. Clearly these TSO's either slept through their training or haven't read the 'rules' themselves. Poor overworked TSO's, too busy to keep up with the inconsistent, constantly changing, ambiguous rules? Well, guess what? We pax are just as busy.
Of course, an honest TSO will admit that when there's any doubt, TSA encourages them to make up a rule.
Grrr!
Sometimes the passenger really hasn't bothered to know the rules, or has the "rules don't apply to me" attitude. In my experience, TSOs encounter a few of those passengers and come to believe that all passengers share this attitude.
The reality is that TSOs are usually just a frustrated as passengers about the lack of clear rules which are easy to understand. They don't want to make things up, they don't want to cause undue hardship to passengers, and they don't want to make a mistake which costs passengers their lives.