How To Whiz Past US Immigration Lines in No Time
We all know this particular pain, you’re at the tail end of a long flight home, and all you want to do is get through the airport shenanigans as quickly as possible, but as you approach US Immigration, you see that the line is over an hour long. And I hope this isn’t a layover for you, because you’ll probably spend that hour in line stressing about connections and watching your whole day falling apart.
I’m here to help.
Have you ever used Mobile Passport? If you’ve already experienced the absolute magic of this app, go ahead and skip this post, it’s not for you.
This post is for US Citizens who don’t travel enough for Global Entry to be worth their while, but who want to travel smart and avoid those long immigration lines if they can.
You can grasshopper. You can avoid those long lines in immigration, by using Mobile Passport.
Mobile Passport is a free app provided by US Customs and Border Protection that you can set up really quickly. I set it up while my plane was landing when I was returning from a trip, and used it to enter the country on that same trip. BOOM!
Quick and Easy. This is why I’m on here pushing it. I told y’all, I love an easy button, and this is the easiest of them all.
Most airports have three different lines for US citizens entering the country, Global Entry, Mobile Passport, and Errybody Else. The last time I came into the US, there was one person in front of me in the Mobile Passport line and hundreds of people over there in Errybody Else. And Mobile Passport isn’t just at major airports, it’s also used at cruise ports.
Okay, so how does it work? All you do is download the app, enter your passport info, take a quick picture of yourself on your phone (I look hideous in mine because I was on the tail end of a long-haul flight). That’s the initial set up.
Then each time you enter the country, just open the app, answer those customs/immigrations questions (you smuggling fruit? been kicking it with cows?) and sashay your way past Errybody Else and into the incredibly short Mobile Passport line.
Last time I was entering the US, I had actually forgotten about the app until I saw the big crowd of people in the regular line and whipped out my phone, answered the questions right there in the immigration hall, and moved to the easy-breezy line to avoid the chaos.
If you get to an airport and there is not obvious Mobile Passport line ask the people shooing you into the Errybody Else line where to go.
It really is that quick, cheap, and easy to beat the line and fast track your way through immigration.
Download the app immediately, and let me know how much time you save the first time you use it.