https://www.united.com/web/en-US/app...n/default.aspx

That page should allow you to update your reservation.

APIS is for CBP. Precheck looks at Secure Flight. Enter your GOES number and name as it appears on your GE card in the Secure Flight section on all of your upcoming reservations.

Which can't be changed after booking, right?

You can change it after booking. Go to the airline's web site and find your PNR. From there you can change it. If you can't do it on their website, call their res desk. Some even let you enter your GOES number (PASS ID) while you're checking in.

Just send an email to United asking them to match the name in your MileagePlus account to your GOES name. They emailed me back within a few hours that it was done, and I didn't have issues with PreCheck selection again, even for flights that had previously been booked without my middle name.

KTN and Exact Name Issue?
 

We booked an upcoming domestic trip with Virgin America via Virgin Atlantic using VS points. The reservation successfully appears in VX, however the name displayed uses VS style with a MR and MISS appended in the name. Will this be a conflict with our new KTN - the VX people say they cannot change name. Should VS be able to enter the KTN and have it take effect or is there no problem?

The KTN is more directly and commonly run in a determining way against the name, DOB and sex in the SecureFlight fields than being impacted by titles in name fields that aren't replicated in the edit-able SecureFlight fields.

You should get VX to enter and or validate that the KTN field is populated with your number and that the SecureFlight field info is how you want it to be. It will be the VX filing with the USG that will be the primary driver in whether or not you get kicked back with the PreCheck LLL indicator you want.

The process of updating FF programs after receiving the KTN is an initial minor challenge. Some of my current FF did not have my middle name or gender. UA required photo submission of ID to add MI and gender and VX required a call and then placed the middle name in the first name field saying that is what works best for TSA. SWA was easiest and one call took car of those changes.

Update
 

Update: VX says no way to add the middle names to match KTN which VS did not send over - says its a reward purchase and VS should be able to do on their end. VS says no way to change it now on their end. Hard to believe with a flight two weeks away, not one of them can add a middle name. The middle names are in VX's FF profile, but the reservation is missing middle names. I guess that will mean no TSA pre-check.

Any suggestions?

Maybe, maybe not.

I have a KTN through GE that I've added to all my profiles on airline sites. I've had tickets and boarding passes that ... include my middle name, have my middle initial only, append my middle initial to my first name, append my middle name to my first name, or don't have any middle name or initial at all. I've had Pre-Check with all formats.

So if the name on the airline reservation is "John Doe" but the GOES profile is "John Allan Doe" (Allan under middle name), will one get TSA pre-check? TSA contact center phone rep was saying it has to match word for word

You might, or you might not get it. While it's probably better if it's an exact match, it doesn't have to be.

While I don't like or use my middle name - I just use the initial or nothing - my full middle name is on my drivers license and passport. So I put in my GEOS profile when I applied for GE. But oddly, when my GE card arrived it only had my first and last name.

Since then I've had tickets and boarding passes that ... include my middle name, have my middle initial only, append my middle initial to my first name, append my middle name to my first name, or don't have any middle name or initial at all. I've had Pre-Check with all formats.

The KTN, DOB, Sex and last name fields seem to be the main drivers for a match. Though I imagine there might be more weight given to first and middle names for those with common last names or last names shared with someone on a watch list.

I don't even have a middle name in my passport or Canadian citizenship card. My name is Russian, and Russian full names for men and women typically include the so-called "patronymic" (which really just means your father's name). The US Customers officer added it to to my GOES name, so I'm stuck with that now.... but it's not really a middle name in the sense of Allan in "John Allan Doe".

Since it's nowhere on my passport, I don't think I should include it when purchasing tickets / completing online check in (I think the name on boarding pass must match the passport - correct - so if the passport has no middle name, neither should the boarding pass ?) But of course if I omit it it will not exactly match GOES

I'm just going to have my name changed on my NEXUS. Stupid that I have to pay $ 25 for a replacement card, because they decided to include this middle name, but oh well...

PreCheck name issue - Apostrophe missing, should airline address it?
 

I recently signed up and got approved for TSA PreCheck. The official spelling of my last name has an apostrophe in it. That is how my passport lists it, that is how I registered with the TSA. Example: O'Brien

I went online with Alaska Airlines to edit traveler profile, and edit my existing bookings to add the KTN. When I went back to view it, it didn't display the KTN online, it just said "Secure Flight information has already been collected for this traveler."

This weekend I flew for the first time since getting approved, and I did not have the TSA PreCheck badge on my boarding pass.

I called Alaska Air reservations support, and they were unsure why the badge didn't display. They tried inputting the KTN on their end but could not confirm if it would work. Sure enough, no badge appeared on my app (I even tried printing a boarding pass, no badge).

Alaska Air reservations seemed to think it might be related to the formatting of my last name. When I go to the traveler profile where I enter my KTN, it displays the last name like: O Brien instead of O'Brien. Space instead of apostrophe.

Reservations confirmed that the boarding pass name cannot support apostrophes. This is a problem. On my flight back not only did I not get PreCheck, I got selected for full security sweep, not fun on a 7am flight :(

I'm not going to change my last name, so who can fix this? I imagine TSA won't budge from the official spelling of my last name?

Has anyone dealt with a similar situation with Alaska Air (or any other airline) and if so, how did you resolve it?

If so, who did you call? Airline? TSA? And how did you resolve the situation with them on the phone? Reservations late night seemed confused and I didn't get a chance to call customer service yet.

I read somewhere online that there's a separate field in the reservation for "Secure Traveler Name" or something like that? If that is true, seems like the best solution would be to modify the value there, if it can support apostrophes.

I need to update my existing booked flights and I don't want to have to call to get this manually done every time I fly with Alaska. Does anyone know if they can update my traveler profile permanently so this will happen automatically going forward?

Sorry for the long post and so many questions! First time poster here, found the forum after doing some google searches on the topic, but not finding a specific solution to the problem.