destone

My understanding is that the PCR test result must be presented at the check-in counter at Heathrow. That said, you will be nowhere near said counter as your first leg originates outside Heathrow. I am sure MMB will be clarified soon given that this now affects all US-bound passengers, not just JFK.

Often1

It would be far better if BA did not direct those considering travel to UK government websites and rather to TIMATIC or to a choice of destination government websites. All the more important when requirements are changing by the day if not sooner.

Bear in mind that what started off a week ago as a request by the governor of NY to BA (and other carriers) to voluntary require a test and thus applied only to JFK and not EWR, is now a US government requirement for all US destinations. That could change again tomorrow,

destone

I suspect any revision may not come prior to 20th January.

Jilul

Hi,

According to TravelDoc, when traveling to JFK from the UK

1. If the passenger does not hold a negative Covid-19 test result they will be subject to mandatory quarantine for 14 days on arrival;
2. If the passenger holds a negative Covid-19 test result taken no more than 72 hours prior to arrival in New York state, then the passenger can either quarantine for 14 days on arrival, or on the 4th day they can take the test again, and if a negative result is received the passenger is allowed to exit quarantine

https://www.traveldoc.aero/results

CKBA

A word of caution: Mrs CKBA and I justed booked a Collinson Antigen test at Heathow prior to our flight to the US. Although we did it at the same time (on two laptops), booking the same date and time - which came up okay in the confirmation screen, Mrs CKBA's email confirmation and booking came up as being a day later! Tried again, screen confirmation okay, email/booking confirmation a day later! Tried on my laptop and the booking came out correct. Very odd.

Bottom line - double check that the email/booking date/time are correct!

destone

Thanks for sharing. I continue to rely on https://www.expresstest.co.uk/ as I use them twice-a-month due to work travel.

peter1962

Same thing happened to my US relative. She booked 5 times on 2 computers and while the screen showed Monday, the email showed Tuesday. Since no way to contact Collinson she found a local test facility before going to LHR.

jope_taco

Update on departing ARN on BA777 yesterday, connecting to BA113 to JFK. I was able to OLCI for BA777, but as not even able to select a seat for BA113. The check-in agent, from the local ground-handling company at ARN, seemed quite knowledgeable and was able to issue a boarding pass for the onward journey once he had confirmed that my layover was shorter than 24 hours. He also indicated that entering the UK during your layover would invalidate the test exemption.

At Heathrow T5, I scanned myself into the transfer area without human intervention. Upon boarding, the gate agent again needed to pull up my itinerary to confirm that my stay at Heathrow had been shorter than 24 hours. Overall, the transit was quite smooth.

Now on to the more eventful part of the trip. G-RAES, our ride to JFK, was not having a good day yesterday. During boarding, it occurred to me that the ventilation system sounded very active but in an unusual, strained way. At 30 minutes past our departure time, the captain informs us that there is an issue with an a/c unit, and that engineering are on their way.

A further 30 minutes in, we are told that the unit is defective and that the flight can still proceed with a single "pac" unit, as long as the flight path remains within 60 minutes of a fallback airport, which will require an updated flight plan with all the administration and costs that this involves. I slowly start worrying about navigating a scenario in which the flight ends up being cancelled (organizing an impromptu covid test? "insisting" on being re-routed on a morning service to JFK/EWR with the competition to keep our connection within 24h? ...). Presumably such a scenario could become an issue for ex-UK pax as well, as their 72 hours would be up.

At 2h past scheduled departure, we are informed that all airports but two along our proposed new, northerly flight path have responded and confirmed they're operational. The two holdouts that BA were still trying to get in touch with were a Greenland airport and a northern Canadian one. He also told us that at this point, we had 90 minutes until the two-person flight deck crew would time out, further adding to the suspense.

At 2.5h past departure, the captain comes on with the good news that we are cleared to depart. Twenty minutes later, we are in the air.The revised flight plan had been feared to be two hours longer than usual, but in the end didn't add more than an hour to the standard flight time. Once at the gate, three hours behind schedule, the captain thanked us for our patience and expressed mild surprise that we had been able to make it, considering the challenges.

Thank you and Best wishes for the New Year everyone!

CKBA

Good to know it wasn't just us!

There is an email contact for Collinson if you need to change/cancel the booking [email protected] or online form at https://www.collinsongroup.com/en/contact-us

Meanwhile, I also noted that the CDC also requires an attestation form: https://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/pdf/A...tion_CLEAN.pdf - I don't know whether this would be provided by BA at checkin or whether we're expected to print it out and bring it along (we'll do the latter just in case...).

stimpy

Thanks very much for that and sorry your departure for JFK was so stressful.

fatmac70

Not sure if this is entirely helpful - but I flew back to USA with AA this week and AA had the Attestation form which you mention I completed and signed at check-in.
AA kept the form.

gpp1

I recommend Express Test too. Collinson's customer service is non-existent and their IT isn't much better.

CKBA

Thanks - information from the airlines themselves is somewhat thin!

CKBA

Problem really is the location of the test centres (especially since Bham/NEC is closed at the moment!). Collinson provides a 45 minute test at T5 - would be intrested to know of any actual experiences with them (rather than booking/IT issues).

gpp1

We used them at T5 as a result of participating in the BA trial. My test came back days late with an inconclusive result, my OH's test was lost. So I'm probably not the best person to ask