Originally Posted by
JudyBlueEyes
Thanks for your reply. Yes, he often (almost always) gets the 3 beeps and the OK to use the PreCheck line now. So do others think I can reassure him that Global Entry, not Silver Premium, is what helps him get TSA Pre? I called United yesterday and the customer service agent said using TSA Pre lines DOES depend on having some elite status, but perhaps she was wrong?
One reason he's thinking about paying $900+ for status is because otherwise he might pay for the annual Economy Plus upgrade right ($499) so for just a few hundred dollars more he gets other benefits of Silver. Though probably most of you out there wouldn't pay for Economy Plus either?! Continued thanks, and if anyone else has input/experience on whether TSA Pre depends at all on Silver elite status, it would be great to hear. Judy
His getting PreCheck has absolutely nothing to do with his status, and even if it did, it wouldn't in a couple months because they're ditching status-based PreCheck. He'd be out of his mind to pay a red cent to keep Silver for this reason.
I mega-super-duper-ultra promise that we're right about this. The agent was wrong. Honestly, you shouldn't ask phone agents about stuff like this -- they just haven't the faintest clue what they're talking about. If you must, you should always ignore seemingly-counterfactual statements by agents until you're told the same thing by three different agents at three different call centers across three different days. Or until FT tells you they're right.
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You did the right thing by coming onto here and asking whether the agent was right. If I had a nickel for every time someone comes onto FT and "informs" us about some "new policy" that turns out to be some insane, make-believe ramblings by an uninformed agent...