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Originally Posted by sirrebral
(Post 27230774)
SFO - yes [6h 15m] (9/18/16 3am)
Here's a recap of my experience, and what I learned speaking with other walk-ins: ARRIVAL TIMES Overall, I was very pleased with the experience; the staff was courteous, and the walk-ins formed a camaraderie that was helpful when someone needed to step out of line to go to the restroom or grab a coffee. But most of all, I'm glad that I put this task behind me in time for a couple upcoming trips. I didn't need to wait 6 months for my scheduled interview, and prospects for rescheduling at SFO are low since they're *slammed*... NorCal is home to 40% of California's huge 38 million population yet has just 1 of the state's 7 enrollment sites.After reading many reports of SFO's walk-in waiting list being limited to 6 people per day, I erred on the side of caution by arriving at 3 am. It turns out that I could have saved a couple hours, since the next people on the wait list arrived at 5:30am, 5:45am, 6:25am, 6:50am, and 7:00am. That said, I'm glad I got there early for two reasons: (1) I live nearly 2 hours away from SFO, so I was really motivated to avoid returning home empty-handed, and (2) it appears that Sunday mornings might be slower than normal; one of the others had tried on a Saturday morning and was turned away after the list filled up much sooner. THE WAIT Staff showed up at 6:45am and began regularly scheduled appointments promptly at 7am after verifying who was there. A few minutes later, they passed around a wait list for up to six walk-ins. As the first on the list, I ended up being called in about 9:15am. The fifth person on the list later reported that the other walk-ins had their names called at 9:35am, 9:50am, 10am, and 10:10am. So, on this particular day, the office managed to get all 6 walk-ins processed within 4 hours of opening the door for scheduled interviews. YMMV. SECOND SHIFT Back to the list: once it reached 6 names around 7am, the staff advised subsequent walk-ins to come back around the time of the office's shift change at 3:30pm. This was consistent with some reviews I'd read on another site, including a couple who successfully walked-in the previous Sunday afternoon (they were numbers 3 & 4 on the afternoon list after showing up at 2:45pm, and they had to wait 4 hours for their names to be called.) The key takeaway I got from that report and my experience is that folks can ignore the GE website's posted hours for Sundays at the SFO office (8am - 3:30pm); it looks like they keep the same interview hours every day of the week, at least for the time being. |
Originally Posted by 1KChinito
(Post 27233431)
Welcome to FT. As stiladam suggested, keep trying to do a new search every 5 minutes or so. In a day or two, you should be able to find an acceptable appointment; sometimes in the next day.
SFO Global Entry office opens very long hours daily unlike other locations. Six walk ins are allowed for each shift. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/27230774-post298.html |
Reporting on behalf of a co-worker who successfully did a walk-in at SFO today thanks in no small part to this thread :D
1. arrived SFO 7:45am, heard there had already been 30 walk-ins waiting at 7am, with the first 6 waitlisted and the rest all turned away 2. returned 3:45pm and squeaked into the 6th position on the waitlist. #1 had arrived at 2pm (they opened the evening waitlist at 3pm for shift beginning 3:30pm). Co-worker was eventually interviewed at 6:15pm. |
Applied for Global Entry for my wife and our 1yr old son. Scheduled appointments at EWR first for my son, then a few weeks later for my wife. The hope was that they would take both at the first appointment. Nope!!! After processing my son (1min of their time!) they kicked my wife out. Didn't WANT to process her even though she is inside, with her docs, and they hardly spent any time on my son. Two agents were free - no matter.
Ridiculous! This is where my tax dollars go?! |
Originally Posted by glroark
(Post 27257983)
Applied for Global Entry for my wife and our 1yr old son. Scheduled appointments at EWR first for my son, then a few weeks later for my wife. The hope was that they would take both at the first appointment. Nope!!! After processing my son (1min of their time!) they kicked my wife out. Didn't WANT to process her even though she is inside, with her docs, and they hardly spent any time on my son. Two agents were free - no matter.
Ridiculous! This is where my tax dollars go?! Another perspective is that some offices schedule 4 interviews an hour for each of their 3 - 4 staff members, 16 hours per day, 7 days a week for up to 6 months. Thus, as many as 35,000 to 45,000 applicants have been asked to respect the schedule, and most of them do, even though--like most of us--they also have scheduled flights in the near future, and more pressing things to do than spend their free time at the airport. I'm not certain that it's fair to expect staff to permit a system where anyone can piggyback on their family members' schedules. If every person who travels with family was allowed to ask for such an exception, those experiences would end up reported here in this forum, and we could expect that on-time performance of regularly-scheduled interviews would suffer as the practice gained popularity. |
Originally Posted by glroark
(Post 27257983)
Applied for Global Entry for my wife and our 1yr old son. Scheduled appointments at EWR first for my son, then a few weeks later for my wife. The hope was that they would take both at the first appointment. Nope!!! After processing my son (1min of their time!) they kicked my wife out. Didn't WANT to process her even though she is inside, with her docs, and they hardly spent any time on my son. Two agents were free - no matter.
Ridiculous! This is where my tax dollars go?! |
I applied for Global Entry on 9/18 and conditionally approved 9/27. I looked around for Interview Appts around California and the earliest I got was at SFO on 12/31. I was a little discouraged by the possibility of waiting 3 months for the interview so I kept refreshing the GOES webpage every 15 mins or so for earlier times and in a span of 5 hours I was able to upgrade my interview date from 12/31 to 11/15 to finally 10/12. I thought, "Cool! Waiting 2 weeks isn't bad at all!"
Then the better news. I was in the SFO area so I decided to try my luck at a walk-in after work and I was able to get in and approved tonight at 9/29! SFO takes 6 walk-ins per shift, not per day. So, you have 2 opportunities (the morning shift and the afternoon shift) to get on the waiting list. I heard that the early weekday evenings seem to work better for walk-ins rather than the morning walk-ins so I tried my luck and it worked. The shift change happens around 3pm. So I went from applying on 9/18 to conditional approval on 9/27 to real approval on 9/29 at SFO. My only advice to everyone is to be patient and be persistent. Even if you have an interview way out in the future, try your luck with a walk-in. SFO was not busy at all. SFO - Yes [40m] (9/29/16 6:40pm); |
Originally Posted by deepfriedadobo
(Post 27283087)
I applied for Global Entry on 9/18 and conditionally approved 9/27. I looked around for Interview Appts around California and the earliest I got was at SFO on 12/31. I was a little discouraged by the possibility of waiting 3 months for the interview so I kept refreshing the GOES webpage every 15 mins or so for earlier times and in a span of 5 hours I was able to upgrade my interview date from 12/31 to 11/15 to finally 10/12. I thought, "Cool! Waiting 2 weeks isn't bad at all!"
Then the better news. I was in the SFO area so I decided to try my luck at a walk-in after work and I was able to get in and approved tonight at 9/29! SFO takes 6 walk-ins per shift, not per day. So, you have 2 opportunities (the morning shift and the afternoon shift) to get on the waiting list. I heard that the early weekday evenings seem to work better for walk-ins rather than the morning walk-ins so I tried my luck and it worked. The shift change happens around 3pm. So I went from applying on 9/18 to conditional approval on 9/27 to real approval on 9/29 at SFO. My only advice to everyone is to be patient and be persistent. Even if you have an interview way out in the future, try your luck with a walk-in. SFO was not busy at all. SFO - Yes [40m] (9/29/16 6:40pm); |
ATL-yes [45min] (9/20/16 1pm)
I received conditional approval for Global Entry on September 16, but found that the only open interview slots available for scheduling in Atlanta at that time were in January 2017.
I had a flight out of Atlanta scheduled for September 20 at 3:30pm, so I decided to try for a walk-in interview before my flight. I arrived at the airport a couple hours early (around 1pm), signed in, and took a seat in the waiting area. There was already one other person waiting for a walk-in interview who had signed in just before me. He was called in for an interview after a wait of about 20 minutes. I was called back for an interview after waiting about 45 minutes. The interview itself took about 15 minutes, and I was out the door and on the way to my departure gate by 2pm. |
Originally Posted by gate89
(Post 27285913)
I received conditional approval for Global Entry on September 16, but found that the only open interview slots available for scheduling in Atlanta at that time were in January 2017.
I had a flight out of Atlanta scheduled for September 20 at 3:30pm, so I decided to try for a walk-in interview before my flight. I arrived at the airport a couple hours early (around 1pm), signed in, and took a seat in the waiting area. There was already one other person waiting for a walk-in interview who had signed in just before me. He was called in for an interview after a wait of about 20 minutes. I was called back for an interview after waiting about 45 minutes. The interview itself took about 15 minutes, and I was out the door and on the way to my departure gate by 2pm. |
BOS - No [60m] 10/01/2016 7:30pm
I was there for my appointment and my boyfriend had an appointment 2 weeks later. They wouldn't let him do his interview even though they called me in 15 minutes early for my 7:45pm appointment. |
Originally Posted by Tralit
(Post 27294069)
BOS - No [60m] 10/01/2016 7:30pm
I was there for my appointment and my boyfriend had an appointment 2 weeks later. They wouldn't let him do his interview even though they called me in 15 minutes early for my 7:45pm appointment. |
MIA - Yes [Varies Heavily ~15-45m] 10/01/2016 4:30PM
MIA accepts walk ins after others have been interviewed.
Got mine w/ in 15 minutes of arrival. |
Fastest GE processing time ever?
Applied Thursday Sept 29 around 17:30 Pacific Got conditional approval Tuesday Oct 4 19:09 (3 business days!) Walk-in GE interview at SFO Wednesday Oct 5 10:40 GE Officially Approved Wednesday Oct 15 12:23. SFO - Yes/[5h50m] (Oct-05-2016 04:52) I think I did that right. I have no idea what yes/no means, I don't see it explained in the wiki or in the first few posts. I did not have an appointment, I walked in. I thought SFO GE opened at 07:00 and I read on Yelp of people getting there by 6:30ish; I figured I was better off shooting for 5/5:30 and instead managed to arrive early, eg, before 5. I had been hoping I'd wait 2 hours and get right in by being first rather than delaying arrival by 30mins but being 3rd or 4th on the list. There were 6 people waiting by about 07:15. As you can deduce, it took over 2.5h for me to get in as #1; that said, #2 got taken in at the same time as me. Also, short term parking cost $36 ($2 per 15m up to max $36) even though the sign said "full day $25". |
Originally Posted by Reid Conti
(Post 27307420)
Fastest GE processing time ever?
Applied Thursday Sept 29 around 17:30 Pacific Got conditional approval Tuesday Oct 4 19:09 (3 business days!) Walk-in GE interview at SFO Wednesday Oct 5 10:40 GE Officially Approved Wednesday Oct 15 12:23. SFO - Yes/[5h50m] (Oct-05-2016 04:52) I think I did that right. I have no idea what yes/no means, I don't see it explained in the wiki or in the first few posts. I did not have an appointment, I walked in. I thought SFO GE opened at 07:00 and I read on Yelp of people getting there by 6:30ish; I figured I was better off shooting for 5/5:30 and instead managed to arrive early, eg, before 5. I had been hoping I'd wait 2 hours and get right in by being first rather than delaying arrival by 30mins but being 3rd or 4th on the list. There were 6 people waiting by about 07:15. As you can deduce, it took over 2.5h for me to get in as #1; that said, #2 got taken in at the same time as me. Also, short term parking cost $36 ($2 per 15m up to max $36) even though the sign said "full day $25". |
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