International transit in DEL
 

I will be arriving in DEL on the AA flight from ORD and then continuing on to BKK about 3 hours later on TG.

Would someone know the transit procedures in DEL? Is there a transit desk where I could get my TG boarding pass without much of a hassle or wait?

More important, would I be able to access any kind of lounge (am *Gold) in the airside transit area?

Or is clearing customs (and wasting time, obliterating another page on my passport with two fat Indian stamps etc) my only option? If so, what is the easiest way to get from the arrivals area to the departure level? Is it as simple as an elevator ride (as in other airports)? Knowing DEL, I suppose not..:mad:

I've moved this into the India forum, where I think you will get better responses. I've just spent a few minutes searching for relevant threads. I'm not sure these are spot on, but might be worth a browse:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/india...8-present.html

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...leage-run.html

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-...port-pics.html

SanDiego1K
Senior Moderator

Eh what .. about fat indian stamps. As far as I can see the indian entry and exit stamps are quite small, the same size as US entry and exit stamps. At least for me as an indian citizen. Is there another / extra stamp for foreign nationals, that's fat?

Well, most of us foreign nationals need to get a pretty darn fat full-page visa sticker and pay a fair chunk of change for the privilege...

I don't know whether you can do an airside transit, but the lounges are between outbound immigration and security, so not quite airside. You can go back through security though - there's a counter where the supervisor can let you back out to access the lounges. They're all contract lounges though, so you need either a lounge invite from checkin (don't know if a transit desk could issue one if it exists) or a Priority Pass.

Who said that the US immigration stamps are thin? For thin ones, look at Singapore or the Japanese exit stamp. I am tired of having to get a new passport every 3 years (each time with increased biometric hassle and expense) because zealous immigration officers (who have an inflated idea of their own importance) want to deface my passport.

Savio - I suspected as much. I think I will just try the international transfer desk (will be a first for me after 30 years of flying into Delhi) and if faced with either a long wait or any unpleasantness, I will simply clear immigration and deal with the crowds of the departure hall and the imbecile security folks

I have a question that perhaps someone can answer. We are traveling EWR -DEL next week, arriving on CO at about 8:35 in the evening. Our connecting flight is CX at about 3:30 am - so about an 8 hour layover.

The CO and CX tickets are booked on separate itineraries (reward travel). My question is - if we check a bag through on CO to DEL, I am assuming we will need to clear customs to pick up the bag and recheck on CX. So will we be required to exit the airport terminal? Or can we wait inside? Or is there a drop point for CX that we can take the bags to?

It looks like another flight to HKG leaves at 11:45 pm, would we be able to check in then?

Sorry if dumb questions - it's just unclear to me what will happen when transiting to another airline with checked bags on separate itin. (I never check bags so there is that). :)

This isn't a DEL-specific question. I did something similar in April. When I checked in for an LY flight at TLV I showed them also my seperate itin for a TG domestic flight. They tagged the bags all the way through. You should be able to just do something similar to the poster above and show your passport, baggage receipt and whatnot to someone at the transfer area and that should ensure your bag is transferred.

If CO isn't willing to tag the bags all the way to HKG or wherever the CX itinerary is headed, then I would go through immigration and customs to get my bags checked in again -- that or I would be prepared for a problem of some sort such as in finding some CO or CX rep at DEL to claim the bags on my behalf and get them re-tagged and help with the onward check-in formalities.

If CO is willing to tag the bags even when the trip involves another ticketed itinerary, then you'd be able to do this all without having to go through all of the immigration and customs arrangement for arriving passengers (destined to just DEL) -- still you would have to deal with a transit agent at the desk.

I called CO - no issues checking bags to CX - should have called them in the first place.

Sounds like we will be able to get our onward CX tickets from the transfer desk. And if I read correctly, the transfer desk is still airside, so we will need to go back through security to get to the lounge.

We are in J on CX - but no one was able to clarify whether one could get the lounge invite from the xfer desk - we'll see how that works out.

If you've flown this already, what did you end up doing? I never thought I'd be doing this, but a BA tier point run has me flying HKG-DEL on CX connecting to DEL-HEL on AY.

I would like to know as well. Or any information on what we could/should have done differently.

We were unsuccessful in transiting and ended up clearing immigration (Note this also forced us out of the terminal, giving us a few hours *across the street* waiting to get back into the airport - our layover was very long. Yes, this is what I thought might happen).

When the plane arrived in DEL, the first thing we did was to ask a rep on the jetway how to go about transiting. She looked at us like we had 6 heads and asked if we had a visa (yes we did). She indicated we would need to clear immigration and then reenter. When asked if it was possible to transfer w/o clearing immigrations, she said no.

Well, ok, fine. Perhaps she was not the correct person to be talking to - we decided just to keep an eye out for signs to a transfer desk (as someone on FT indicated). Indeed there was a split in the hallway for Transfers and Arrivals. We headed down the Transfers hallway but didn't get too far before a DEL rep stopped us and told us we weren't supposed to be there. We again indicated we wanted to just transfer as we had a connecting flight on CX. He walked us back to the CO gate and got an airline representative. The airline rep asked us if we had Visas (again, yes we did). He indicated it was possible to transfer but we definitely didn't want to do that as there was nothing to do, no restaurants, etc and the best option would be to clear immigrations.

I will admit at that point in time I just gave up - I didn't feel like dealing with the unknown. We had enough time so we just went through immigration and as mentioned before, spent a few hours outside the DEL airport.

A side note - it did appear that DEL was letting people in at about 4 hours before the flight departure time, rather than the 3 hours that I expected - this was also true on way out two weeks later (we stopped in DEL for a few days on our way home) - we got into the airport at about 4.5 hours out - this definitely confused the immigration officer.

Another note - DEL is now charging 1300 INR per person for a new Airport departure tax - so in effect it cost us INR 2600 (about $56) at the time for the privilege of transferring. This was charged to us at the CX gate. Not sure if they are bundling the fee into the ticket now but ours were booked in Feb, before the fees took effect in March.

International transit in DEL - what happened
 

Summary - Transit is certainly possible, no need to clear immigration
==================================================

I arrived on AA from ORD to DEL and was booked on TG about 4 hours later to BKK. Upon exiting the jetbridge I headed for the doorway marked 'Transit', only to be refused admission without an airline escort. Went back to the jetbridge and collected an AA agent, who indeed had to escort me into the transit area after logging me in at a register with this security guard.

The transit area is pretty small (even by DEL standards) and has a few tables, a cafe and a STD (phone) booth. I was asked to wait there by the AA agent, who returned after about 5 minutes with a TG agent. When I told the TG agent that I wished to get to the lounge a.s.a.p., she took me there (without going through immigration) and installed me at the lounge. At this point she took my passport and then returned 30 minutes later with the boarding pass.

I had no checked baggage and both agents found that to be somewhat unusual for someone flying ORD-DEL-BKK :)

The whole process from exiting the plane to entering the lounge took about 15 minutes. Although I do have a multiple-entry Indian visa, neither the AA nor the TG agent asked whether I had a visa. In the transit area I did notice several French men/women hanging around; judging from their clothes etc. I would imagine that they must have arrived from KTM. One reason why they were suspended in purgatory may have been that their departing flight was much later and no agents for that departing carrier were available to bring their boarding passes or take them through to the departure area.

Anyway, the trick is to ask an agent of the arriving carrier to escort you to the transit area and then hand you over to an agent of the departing carrier.

FedUp2 - thanks for the info! Glad it worked out for you. Wish I had known this three weeks earlier! :D