Originally Posted by
rwoman
I am a US Passport holder with Global Entry and flew LHR-ORD last week. It'd been a long day already and I was tired after it taking 20 minutes to get to a GE kiosk.
The CPB officer checking GE print outs and passport exchange ...
CBP: Where are you coming from?
Me: London
CBP: Why were you in London?
Me: I live in the UK.
CBP: What do you do?
Me: I work for the government.
CBP: How long are you here for? Why are you here?
<by this point I was annoyed, as this was a first US CBP grilling for me>
Me: Is it any of your business? I'm a US Passport holder. I can stay in this country for as long as I like. I'm headed home to see my family.
At this point he just glared at me and handed my passport and receipt back to me.
Maybe it was jet lag or I was just feeling punchy, but I definitely did not appreciate it.
Is the GE experience more frequently turning out to be like the APC kiosk-using or non-kiosk-using POE experience for non-GE pax? It almost seems to have come to that.
While the last set of CBP questions can come across as annoying to US citizens with residence(s) abroad, the reason it may be relevant for US citizens too is because the duty-free customs allowances vary based on residence rather than on citizenship.
It's sort of unfortunate that the CBP plays a "gotcha" game with some of the questions it asks, but it may be faster to ask the questions that way than to it is to give an explanation each and every time about why a question is going to being asked and then asking the question.
In some ways, the CBP is stuck in a thankless, difficult position. While I too have been on the receiving end of some CBP games, it's rare that they've gone overboard on my entries to the US -- and I have a ridiculously large number of encounters with the CBP.