Brussels Passport Sticker Fiasco
Mar 13, 2023, 9:03 pm
#46
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 57,595
Try flying out of Munich, there’s the total goat rodeo.
Hit the US area “where are you going?”
“San Francisco”
points me to middle moving walkway
get to end of walkway, sticker questions. I pass the test. “Go ahead”
Start walking towards the next flogging. Two guys standing off to the side “What did they say to you!?”
me: <very confused look> “I’m sorry?”
guys: “What did they say to you!?”
<more confused look>
<German stare>
”Go ahead?”
Germans smile and chuckle “ok, go ahead”
Get to x-ray and nude-o-scope. Dismantle carefully packed bags and selected ensemble
X-ray organizer picks up my travel folio and starts leafing though the old boarding passes sticking out of the pocket on the back (without asking or saying a word)
”what do you need?”
<keeps leafing>
”Do you need my boarding pass? It’s not in there, it’s on my phone”
(can’t remember if I dug out my phone for this or not)
Wait an eternity for bags to move (German efficiency is a myth)
4 of 5 bins selected for secondary (including my sneakers? Same happened to the guy behind me)
Reconstitute my belongings and wardrobe, present my self to next gauntlet
”what do you need this time”
”Passport and boarding pass”
Hand him passport, show him phone
”I need ze paper boarding pass, I have to stamp it”
<voice getting increasingly more frustrated> “Well you’re going to have to stamp my phone, I don’t have a paper one”
Guy smiles and tenor changes to a pleasant one “Not today! I write it out”
Proceeds to copy my name and flight info to a card stock blank BP, stamps it
”Have a nice flight”
Approach boarding door
”Scan”
scan my phone and board. No check of passport or this stamp I just got
I approached the first feat of strength about 40 minutes before departure and I was the only one, there were only about 50 people on the 777 MUC-SFO. I can’t imagine what a mess this would have been if all three flights departing to the US at the same time had been full.
Hit the US area “where are you going?”
“San Francisco”
points me to middle moving walkway
get to end of walkway, sticker questions. I pass the test. “Go ahead”
Start walking towards the next flogging. Two guys standing off to the side “What did they say to you!?”
me: <very confused look> “I’m sorry?”
guys: “What did they say to you!?”
<more confused look>
<German stare>
”Go ahead?”
Germans smile and chuckle “ok, go ahead”
Get to x-ray and nude-o-scope. Dismantle carefully packed bags and selected ensemble
X-ray organizer picks up my travel folio and starts leafing though the old boarding passes sticking out of the pocket on the back (without asking or saying a word)
”what do you need?”
<keeps leafing>
”Do you need my boarding pass? It’s not in there, it’s on my phone”
(can’t remember if I dug out my phone for this or not)
Wait an eternity for bags to move (German efficiency is a myth)
4 of 5 bins selected for secondary (including my sneakers? Same happened to the guy behind me)
Reconstitute my belongings and wardrobe, present my self to next gauntlet
”what do you need this time”
”Passport and boarding pass”
Hand him passport, show him phone
”I need ze paper boarding pass, I have to stamp it”
<voice getting increasingly more frustrated> “Well you’re going to have to stamp my phone, I don’t have a paper one”
Guy smiles and tenor changes to a pleasant one “Not today! I write it out”
Proceeds to copy my name and flight info to a card stock blank BP, stamps it
”Have a nice flight”
Approach boarding door
”Scan”
scan my phone and board. No check of passport or this stamp I just got
I approached the first feat of strength about 40 minutes before departure and I was the only one, there were only about 50 people on the 777 MUC-SFO. I can’t imagine what a mess this would have been if all three flights departing to the US at the same time had been full.
Mar 14, 2023, 4:14 am
#48
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: West of CLE
Programs: Delta DM/3 MM; Hertz PC; National EE; Amtrak GR; Bonvoy Silver; Via Rail Préférence
Posts: 5,384
Flying BRU-ORD. Check in on-line with the app. Get the green “ Travel Ready” button. Cool. Go to airport, clear security. Go to de-immigration control and get my passport stamped. Cool. Find the lounges, and chill out until about 15 min before the flight, pre-boarding 1K and lounges go great together. Walk up to the pre-board entrance with my pass port and BP on my app- and they ask where my ‘sticker’ is. I give them a quizzical look? What sticker?
“The sticker on your passport, oh then you need to get in that 40 person line down there and get a sticker..”. (Here is where it was kind of weird, because it seems that the ‘sticker checker’ might have been able to let me through, but the UA person and the sticker Nazi both kind of chuckled and said “Naaaahhhh.”.).
We are boarding, the sticker line is loooong. I pull a DYKWIA and walk right up to the sticker guy and ask where the premier access is. I have no idea if there is, but I’m going to miss my flight if I have to wait in the whole line. The dude asks me how long I was there, what I was doing- two follow-up questions. Get my sticker and I’m back to the gate. PB line is closed, and the GA tells me back of the BG1 line. I tell her that ain’t happening. LSS, I never saw the end of the BG1 line.
I’m pretty hot, but coming down since I’m set to board and it all worked out. Ask the couple in front of me about their sticker experience. They say that they got theirs at check-in since they had bags. It looked like to me and the other pre-boarder that ended up having to get a sticker had just carry ons.
I cleared out-bound immigration where they stamp your passport. I would have thought that and the Travel ready was all I needed. In retrospect I wondered if I just needed to show them my passport stamp- did they think that I was non-shengghen and you need the stamp for transfers- but the couple that had checked in had a sticker and the originated in BRU.
I’m not a globetrotter, but not my first rodeo. I have stickers all over my old passport. I’ve never anywhere had to seek out a ‘sticker’ dude to get out? Sure, you get a sticker, but it is part of the process and you usually can’t proceed with out it.
Anyone have any insights on why BRU almost ended up being a fiasco for me?
“The sticker on your passport, oh then you need to get in that 40 person line down there and get a sticker..”. (Here is where it was kind of weird, because it seems that the ‘sticker checker’ might have been able to let me through, but the UA person and the sticker Nazi both kind of chuckled and said “Naaaahhhh.”.).
We are boarding, the sticker line is loooong. I pull a DYKWIA and walk right up to the sticker guy and ask where the premier access is. I have no idea if there is, but I’m going to miss my flight if I have to wait in the whole line. The dude asks me how long I was there, what I was doing- two follow-up questions. Get my sticker and I’m back to the gate. PB line is closed, and the GA tells me back of the BG1 line. I tell her that ain’t happening. LSS, I never saw the end of the BG1 line.
I’m pretty hot, but coming down since I’m set to board and it all worked out. Ask the couple in front of me about their sticker experience. They say that they got theirs at check-in since they had bags. It looked like to me and the other pre-boarder that ended up having to get a sticker had just carry ons.
I cleared out-bound immigration where they stamp your passport. I would have thought that and the Travel ready was all I needed. In retrospect I wondered if I just needed to show them my passport stamp- did they think that I was non-shengghen and you need the stamp for transfers- but the couple that had checked in had a sticker and the originated in BRU.
I’m not a globetrotter, but not my first rodeo. I have stickers all over my old passport. I’ve never anywhere had to seek out a ‘sticker’ dude to get out? Sure, you get a sticker, but it is part of the process and you usually can’t proceed with out it.
Anyone have any insights on why BRU almost ended up being a fiasco for me?
Mar 14, 2023, 4:24 am
#49
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: West of CLE
Programs: Delta DM/3 MM; Hertz PC; National EE; Amtrak GR; Bonvoy Silver; Via Rail Préférence
Posts: 5,384
The Europeans haven't really come around on the whole low-hassle experience we're used to in the US where you checkin online, head to the lounge via a series of priority lines, then straight to pre-boarding. Very attached to the sticker game and implementing it for the lowest common denominator pax without differentiated handling for different pax profiles.
I didn't travel to Europe between mid-December, 2019 and early October, 2022. I have been on two trans-Atlantic trips since, one to AMS, the other to LHR. The ICTS agents, if they still exist, didn't come up to me at either airport as I went to check-in, and I did not receive a sticker at either place.
I've always thought the whole "exit visa" system to be a waste of time, but on one trip the crack Marechausee immigration police at AMS caught the guy in front of me for overstaying his visa by two days; they led him away to who knows where.
Mar 14, 2023, 5:24 am
#50
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I remember when Delta had a company called ICTS interview you at a European airport before being allowed to proceed to the counter to check in, and they would put a sticker on the back of your passport.
I didn't travel to Europe between mid-December, 2019 and early October, 2022. I have been on two trans-Atlantic trips since, one to AMS, the other to LHR. The ICTS agents, if they still exist, didn't come up to me at either airport as I went to check-in, and I did not receive a sticker at either place.
I've always thought the whole "exit visa" system to be a waste of time, but on one trip the crack Marechausee immigration police at AMS caught the guy in front of me for overstaying his visa by two days; they led him away to who knows where.
I didn't travel to Europe between mid-December, 2019 and early October, 2022. I have been on two trans-Atlantic trips since, one to AMS, the other to LHR. The ICTS agents, if they still exist, didn't come up to me at either airport as I went to check-in, and I did not receive a sticker at either place.
I've always thought the whole "exit visa" system to be a waste of time, but on one trip the crack Marechausee immigration police at AMS caught the guy in front of me for overstaying his visa by two days; they led him away to who knows where.
What the OP experienced with the passport sticker situation at BRU is not part and parcel of an “exit visa” system. Exit controls are distinct from exit visa systems. Even as exit visa systems do typically involve exit controls, not all exit control-utilizing systems have exit visas. I’ve not seen a Schengen exit visa in at least the last 20 years. And the Schengen country exit stamps in my US passports are not an exit visas. ICTS and other such TSA-wanted-and-approved security contractors for US-bound flights from Europe are not part and parcel of a European exit visa system, but they are part of a USG-required security screening protocol even at airports with CBP IAP in place.
What you observed at AMS is unlikely to have been an exit visa system, even as there is exit control (and still exit stamping for most US passport users) when leaving the Schengen area by common carrier scheduled flights. Also, an initial perception or claim of an overstay in the Schengen area isn't necessarily an overstay.
Mar 14, 2023, 5:37 am
#51
Join Date: Nov 2014
Location: SIN and Medway, UK (so... LCY/LGW/BRU)
Programs: A3 *G, BA OWS, VS Gold, IHG Diamond Amb, Bonvoy Plat
Posts: 749
The Europeans haven't really come around on the whole low-hassle experience we're used to in the US where you checkin online, head to the lounge via a series of priority lines, then straight to pre-boarding. Very attached to the sticker game and implementing it for the lowest common denominator pax without differentiated handling for different pax profiles.
When's the last time you've been out of the US and travelled intra-Europe or Europe-somewhere-not-America?
Mar 14, 2023, 5:43 am
#52
Join Date: Apr 2019
Posts: 979
Mar 14, 2023, 5:54 am
#53
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The Europeans haven't really come around on the whole low-hassle experience we're used to in the US where you checkin online, head to the lounge via a series of priority lines, then straight to pre-boarding. Very attached to the sticker game and implementing it for the lowest common denominator pax without differentiated handling for different pax profiles.
Of my many CPH-US flights during March 2020-2023 operated by SAS, I have received a grand total of zero security contractor stickers on my passports for those flights.
Last edited by GUWonder; Mar 14, 2023 at 6:01 am
Mar 14, 2023, 6:03 am
#55
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Mar 14, 2023, 7:42 am
#56
Join Date: Mar 2018
Programs: UA 1K, AA EXP. Hilton Diamond
Posts: 1,134
Bzzzt. Wrong answer. It also asks about and scans your passport,and only then says “Travel Ready”. It cover immigration because one the way to the EU I was surprised to see that you need a VISA for the EU…. Unless you are there for a short stay (months). I had never seen that.
In sum, "Travel Ready" on a BP isn't a lie as was said. With that process UA determined you are travel ready for covid related issues based on the questions answered. Airport security Passport/BP stickers (again, the subject of this thread) have nothing to do with the UA TRC.
Mar 14, 2023, 9:03 am
#57
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Join Date: Nov 2013
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Travel ready includes passport and visa information. I don’t know how many times I have to mention that before people realize that I’m not kidding. You go through the passport stuff and then onto the COVID info. Maybe you guys dont’ use the UA app. Maybe you always check in with bags. Check in with the UA app and it asks for passport and then tells you that you don’t need covid stuff. The sticker checks in the past have been so cursory that I assumed that they were just to check that you were legal to board- you know, passport and ticker stuff- the stuff that the app asks for before it says “Travel Ready”.
Also, if you read through this thread and don’t realize that the sticker mafia is a complete chimera from location to location, from day to day, from carrier to carrier you are not paying attention. And a ‘minor inconvenience’ would have lead to missing my flight. I’m not the only person, there was another guy with me in PB that gave them a ... look.
And for all the emails and pop ups and alerts that the UA app shoots at you, they don’t actually send you one reminding you of a step that is required to actually board the plane? Or when I asked at the kiosk where the lounges were, or at the lounges, or in the 15 minutes I was standing in front of the gate. Nothing.
Also, if you read through this thread and don’t realize that the sticker mafia is a complete chimera from location to location, from day to day, from carrier to carrier you are not paying attention. And a ‘minor inconvenience’ would have lead to missing my flight. I’m not the only person, there was another guy with me in PB that gave them a ... look.
And for all the emails and pop ups and alerts that the UA app shoots at you, they don’t actually send you one reminding you of a step that is required to actually board the plane? Or when I asked at the kiosk where the lounges were, or at the lounges, or in the 15 minutes I was standing in front of the gate. Nothing.
Mar 14, 2023, 9:14 am
#58
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For US citizens, only thing needed is a passport. No COVID crap or anything. I just showed up at the airport, had my passport swiped and got my boarding passes.
Mar 14, 2023, 9:17 am
#59
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Being UA “travel ready” via the app or website doesn’t exempt UA passengers from checks by the UA security contractors for UA’s flights to the US. Having a “docs ok” stamped/type boarding pass for US-bound flights is also not a definite exemption from these checks by the security contractors there to work to the USG’s specs for the covered US-bound flights.
Mar 14, 2023, 10:54 am
#60
Join Date: Jun 2008
Posts: 2,203
I like Travel Ready. Rather than using the TIMATIC tool, it advises me if my passport does not have validity, or a visa needs to be uploaded etc. I can start this process well before check-in. I haven't run into it yet, but I understand it also flags needed vaccines (not COVID, but yellow fever, for example).
In no way was Travel Ready designed to skirt any of the seemingly random secondary security requirements.
