TWA884

According to our resident CBP officer, all Global Entry applications background investigations are done in Vermont:

elc2414

"As it is explained to me, all applications are sent to our background investigators in VT. They all get divided up amongst the workers there, and it gets done when it gets done. This is why two people who apply at the same time, at the same computer, with the same information, will have their applications approved at different times."

The way I would look at it is this: That most certainly does NOT explain why some people get approved long before others do even though they applied later. Makes no sense - if they are all done in the same office there shouldn't be "out of sequence" approvals. Unless they just have a bunch of goof offs in that office and very few people who are actually doing their job. <deleted by moderator>

mnbp

You assume that the goal is to provide a uniform (or "fair" as in first-in-first-out) customer service experience to each applicant.

That is obviously not the goal. The goal is to assure that only eligible individuals are granted the privilege of GE, based on the eligibility criteria they have decided to use. The business process CBP has implemented addresses their goal, not your assumed goal.

justinjohnson

Sharing my timeline: applied on Dec 2, received conditional approval today

GoodFastOrCheap

Edited my other reply and creating another for reference.
Applied and charged December 2nd.

CONDITIONALLY APPROVED 02/19/2019!!!!

elc2414

Looks like they are finally into December now based on the recent posts about getting conditional approval.

84fiero

There will always be some amount of out-of-sequence conditional approvals, due to the variation in the amount and nature of background data present for each applicant. Also there will be some variation in the speed that each CBP person completes their review of each similar type (i.e., I assume there is a range from easier to more difficult ones due to the amount of data to sift through, etc.) of application. Though a given set of fully trained and capable workers ought to be relatively similar in their task completion time, there will always be some individuals who are faster and some who are slower. Ideally management takes those and other factors into account.

If there is a reasonably consistent distribution and management of workload, factoring in the known variables, then there shouldn't be too many wild swings in conditional decision times for similar types of applications over the long run. That isn't to say that CBP needs to have consistent processing time as its goal per se, just that such large unpredictable variations might be symptomatic of inefficiencies or randomness in their processes. (Of course the shutdown threw everything out of whack.)

And of course we don't know to what extent the data points in this thread are representative of the entire universe of applications, either. According to a 2014 CBP statistic cited in Wikipedia, about 50,000 applications are filed monthly on average. The quantity of unique data points in this thread is but a tiny fraction of the number of GE application filed since 2010 when this thread began. My gut feeling is that many others are seeing large disparities as well, but who knows.

But we'll never really know anything for sure, since we aren't informed as to the details of CBP's review processes. Ideally it would be nice to see more insight into the status of the application - maybe "application has been assigned to a reviewer (or whatever the title)..."reviewer has started working your application"...or similar. But that won't happen.

VegasGambler

You know that your history is clean. The person doing the background check doesn't know that until they finish the background check.

You are just being impatient. Complaints aren't going to make it go any faster. It will be done when it's done.

UKtravelbear

I have a friend who worked in a process driven company and they spent an inordinate amount time each day updating the applications they were dealign with various points in the process but it actually took a lot of time out from actually assessing the applications and doing the checks they needed to do to finish the job. And as it slowed things down they then got lots of complaints ...

A new manager stopped that by reducing the number of processing points that needed to be recorded and productivity soared.

But with GE there are likely to be dozens of processes / data sources involved that applicants might want to know about but don't need to know about and can do nothing about expediting even if they did. And GE processing also needs non federal government organisations to provide data and query resolution and it may not be on top of the AnyState Court House priority list to sort out which of two people with the same name was the criminal and which wasn't. Heck it's likely not on any federal courts clerical workers list either and it'll get done next week when Shona is back from holiday etc etc

Often1

These are key points. Criminal histories are far from clear and it can require real work to determine a final disposition of charges.

sggolf

Applied on 2/12/19
Conditional Approved: 2/19/19
Interview/Approval: 2/28/19
Card: 3/7/19

Kept checking the website and an interview spot opened up. Interview was about 6 minutes long.

For those in the South Bay, Global Entry will be at the Santa Clara Travel Show on March 23/24 at the Convention Center. Free entry and open interview slots too!

Safe travels

elc2414

Congrats on getting conditional approval in 7 days rather than having to wait for more than 2 1/2 months like I and many others on here have and still are........

MLADM89

elc2414

All one has to do is go back and read the last few months' posts to understand that this is an ongoing problem at CBP GE processing. It is not unique to me or countless others posting on here and no telling how many applicants that don't even know about FlyerTalk. I can understand your point about vacations and even the government shutdown causing delays, but this was going on long before that. I've been waiting 2 1/2 months and am leaving tomorrow on an international trip that I could not fathom not having my GE beforehand given when I applied. Again, my wife and I applied within 2 days of each other, she was approved in a few days' time and I am still waiting. I have gone through numerous FBI background checks required for my job every 2 years and numerous Federal Firearms background checks - none of which took more than a couple of weeks to complete.

All the excuses and <deleted by moderator> explanations aside, there is truly something wrong with this system.

sggolf

Did everyone get an email stating conditional approval? I just happened to log into GE and saw approval that day.

Is the airport that you are traveling out of, one of the Global Entry centers where they do interviews? Or any of your layover airports? You might even be able to do your interview on your way back into US under Enrollment upon Arrival. If you are going out of the country, you are probably entering back through one of the major hubs which offers GE. Check out the links which show which booth to go to in each airport.

For example at ORD:
Chicago O'Hare International Airport (ORD)Location:Terminal 5, Booth 58
1000 West O'Hare Avenue
Chicago, IL 60666
Hours of Operation:8:15 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Monday - Friday
Enrollment on Arrival available at Booth 58 if returning from foreign

https://www.cbp.gov/travel/trusted-t...llment-arrival

https://www.cbp.gov/travel/trusted-t...ival/locations

Safe travels.