Talk:United States border preclearance

Who are the agents?

I live in Toronto, and go through preclearance at the airport here several times a year. I've always wondered -- who are these pre-clearance agents???

Are they American Citizens? Canadian Citizens? Dual Citizens? Do they live in Canada full time, or are they from other border posts and doing a "Canadian Rotation"? Do they need a work visa?!? Is there housing for them?

I suspect they are staffed from the nearest US city bureau on secondment in rosters, for example, those working at Niagara Falls and Buffalo Bureau may get a shift at Pearson for part of his/her work. --JNZ (talk) 09:00, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

They clearance airport is a post all by itself, they are US citizens, live in Canada, and have some sort of special visa that authorizes them to live in Canada while working for the CBP. --07:45, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Suggested additions

Are the following true (if so, they'd make good additions to the article)

1. doesn't one also goes through US customs (immediately after the immigration point)?
2. beyond the US-INS point one is one legally inside the US?
3. if one passes through the US-INS point and then decides not to fly, must one go through the host country's immigration point?
4. if a traveller is found to have an outstanding federal arrest warrant, what happens? If this were a normal immigration point they'd be detained, but can this happen at pre-clearance?
5. travellers generally arrive at domestic terminals in the US, and aren't required to undergo further immigration and customs procedures.

-- Finlay McWalter | Talk 13:18, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

On doing some research (links in the article) I've answed these:

1. yes
2. no (despite what one Dublin newspaper article claims)
3. no (you never left the host country)
4. no (although they may try to get local law-enforcement to arrest you, if that's appropriate for the local jurisdiction)
5. yes

-- Finlay McWalter | Talk 22:44, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

I'd have to have somebody check now, but when I went through the Alaska Marine Highway terminal in Prince Rupert, British Columbia as late as 1992, they precleared you there before you got on the ferry to Ketchikan, Alaska and points north. Is that still the case? CJewell (talk) 15:42, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

In Canadian pre-clearance facilities the signage clearly indicates that you are still on Canadian soil and subject to the protections afforded by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and that you may withdraw your application to enter the United States at any point. Interestingly enough, if memory serves me correct the INS staff are empowered to make arrests for breaches of the Criminal Code of Canada within the pre-clearance facility by detaining the suspect and having local law-enforcement summoned.

From my own experience when my flight from Toronto to New York was canceled last April 15, 2007, here are my answers.

1. yes
2. yes (according to the canadian immigration officer because all the passengers were required to go thru canadian immigration and customs)
3. yes (same reason as number 2)
4. have no idea
5. no

Hope it answers your question... -chris^_^ 00:30, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

As to (2): no, after pre-clearance but before leaving the Canadian soil one is still "legally in Canada", just like the passengers who have landed in Canada but have not cleared Canadian immigration/customs etc. yet. That is, Canadian Criminal Code and other laws still apply. Vmenkov 01:19, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Pre clearance airports do not allow clearance for commercial travelers to hand carry commercial goods. 19 CFR 122.1 (g)."Preclearance. “Preclearance” is the examination and inspection of air travelers and their baggage, at the request of an airline, at foreign places where Customs personnel are stationed for that purpose. Preclearance may be used only for air travelers and their baggage, not for merchandise." Passengers with commercial cargo must either ship cargo or cancel their flights and drive over the border. While they benefit most travelers they are a considerable hindrance on trade. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.252.92.98 (talk) 23:26, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

As to 4., I would presume that the most straight-forward approach would be to simply let the person to be arrested board the plane and quietly inform stateside authorities that they need to make an arrest once the plane lands. (Alternatively, the passenger might be arrested during the flight.) I don't think that US authorities are keen on arresting people just before boarding a US-bound plane because then they would have to hand the person over to local authorities and initiate an extradition proceeding which may or may not succeed and requires a lot of paperwork. That said, it makes a lot more sense to let someone travel to the US as a free person and then lay a trap back home. If, however, it looks like the person to be arrested might pose a threat to the security of the flight (Let's say the person is wanted for attempted murder because they attempted to kill other flight passengers in the past), it might be a bad idea to let that person on the plane - not sure how that would be handled.
I have to admit, though, that I don't know if there are rules for US-bound travellers with US arrest warrants on them. -- Dynam1te3 (talk) 11:41, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Renaming

I'm going to rename this to "U.S. border preclearance", as most (all but the Ireland) facilities do the full border works (customs, immigration, agriculture, and public health). "Preclearance" seems to be much more commonly used (even by USCBP), although they also used it with the hyphen. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 23:24, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

"As the U.S. requires those in transit through the U.S to pass through U.S. immigration (unlike many other countries, which permit airside transfers), preclearance also applies to transit passengers."

can somebody clarify the point of that statement? if its a canadian airport, intl-to-intl transfer wouldnt involve us preclearance. intl-to-us transfer would obviously have to go through us immigration.

International flights and order of pre-clearance

Howabout flights originating from a third country and proceeding to the United States with a stopover in Canada? If that airline takes passengers from Canada onward to the United States such as Philippine Airlines which has a route Manila-Vancouver-Las Vegas or Cathay Pacific which has a Hong Kong-Vancouver-JFK route, do all passengers there need to undergo pre-clearance or will they have to clear CBP inspections at the US port of entry?

Also, what is the order of pre-clearance in Canada? Immigration -> Customs -> Check-in? Customs -> Check-in -> Immigration?

You may want to include those points in the article because I am not sure how they work. --58.69.4.249 16:11, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

In my personal experience in Vancouver (from some years back), it is Check-in -> Immigration -> Customs. (They won't let you go to the immigration desk without the boarding pass; and customs always follow immigration, in US airports or border crossings as well). If one flies e.g. YHZ-YUL-EWR, one checks in in Halifax, but only goes thru US immigration and customs in YUL, on the way to his US-bound flight. Vmenkov 00:32, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

In the Cathay example of HKG-YVR-JFK, passengers will go through US preclearance in Vancouver. As far as I know, they will not go through Canadian immigrations and customs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.68.248.39 (talk) 10:42, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

To my knowledge Cathay does not use preclearance. HkCaGu (talk) 15:38, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Correct, Cathay does not use preclearance. Instead, people travelling from YVR to JFK will enter the international departure lounge instead of the preclearance lounge, and all passengers clear US customs in JFK. Briguychau (talk) 21:19, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

Stamped or not?

I recently came back from Toronto to New York last April... when I went thru pre-clearance, they only stamped (the admitted thing...) my boarding pass and my customs and declaration card, but they didn't stamp my passport. Shouldn't this be stated in the article? -chris^_^ 00:24, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

This is not too different from the land borders: they sometimes stamp your passport, and sometimes don't, depending on your nationaliy and status on this visit. E.g., the US Immigration will (usually) stamp somebody's passport if he has to be issued a new I-94 (departure card); but if there is no I-94 (most Canadian citizens on a "visitor for business/pleasaure", i.e. B-1 or B-2 visit), or a the existing I-94 is reused (a Canadian or thrid-country national re-entering the US from Canada and reusing his I-94 issued on an earlier entry into the US), then the Americans usually don't bother stamping his passport. Vmenkov 01:06, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Not all flights...

It seems to me worth noting that not all flights out of the airports listed into the US use the preclearance facilities. For instance, I flew from Bermuda to Baltimore a couple of years ago and we cleared customs at the airport in the US as usual. Before putting in anything about it, it would be useful to determine why some flights use these faciliites and some don't. --Jfruh (talk) 00:29, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Why not other European countries?

Does anyone know why the US made an agreement with Ireland in the 1980s, but no further preclearance facilities have opened in Europe since then? Dublin and Shannon serve relatively few US-bound passengers, compared to London Heathrow or Paris Charles de Gaulle. Was this considered an unsuccessful pilot scheme, or have other EU governments failed to support it? Mtford 02:16, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Irish airports were allowed to have preclearance facilities in exchange for allowing Shannon to be used as a hub for American troops. The main waiting room for transfers is occassionally filled with Army men in the early hours or late at night when there are few passengers about. As for why other European airports don't have them, they probably don't want the hassle of U.S. Immigration in their airports. A passenger would have to arrive to Heathrow or CDG about 60-90 minutes earlier to make it through the process in time to catch his flight. The comparative lack of trans-Atlantic traffic at Dublin/Shannon might actually be what makes preclearance viable.

If someone can find a source, that info would be great to have in the article. --Padraic 23:12, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Other countries?

I know this article is about U.S. border preclearance, but it would be interesting to know about other countries. I seem to remember an official passport check before boarding the London-Paris train, in both directions. Szu (talk) 02:41, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

The Other Way (Flying from US to Canada)

I once flew to Toronto from Auckland years ago. On that flight I literally had two border clearances on the same day: US immigration at LAX, then a domestic flight to ORD, and finally a flight to YYZ that was nothing different from regular domestic flights at ORD (for US airlines, flights to Canada like other intl flights, mostly fly from their own terminals), but on arrival at YYZ I had to undergo immigration and customs and needed to fill in immigration forms - which is something you don't need for land border crossing points.

Does anyone know if clearance procedures for passengers flying to Canada from the US is any different from flying to Canada from other countries, such as fewer forms, different immigration and customs counters or, and less procedures? --JNZ (talk) 09:00, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Not to my knowledge - I have arrived to YVR (and occasionally other Canadian airports) many times on flights both from the US and from the "far abroad" (Mexico, or real "overseas" countries), and there was no difference - in fact, passengers coming from different international flights - whether from US or Europe or Asia - all come to the same passport check gates. Vmenkov (talk) 01:09, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Pedantic officials

"U.S. government officials based in host countries can and do adopt a pedantic and overbearing attitude towards passengers."

This sentence should be deleted. During all my travels to the US for the last 25 years virtually all immigration staff proved to be pedantic and overbearing. This has nothing to to with preclearance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.163.114.7 (talk) 15:51, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Hell I live in the US and they're pedantic and overbearing. 96.86.178.13 (talk) 22:02, 7 April 2021 (UTC)

I can't believe that1

The Article says: "A passenger can choose to abandon their flight and refuse search, and unlike in the United States, officers cannot search them."

But this rule seems so stupid that I just can't believe the U.S. government would ever agree to that. That is like inviting terrorists to go and have a try if they make it on the plane, but if they are found out they just turn away. That's now how things work. So this probably needs to be deleted / updated.--192.138.214.100 (talk) 18:16, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Wording is non-neutral

I recently added a POV-check tag due to the article containing words like 'supposedly' and 'theoretically,' which violates the WP:ALLEGED style guideline. Opinions on the neutrality would be appreciated. Winterswift (talk) 02:31, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

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Definition of Preclearance

The U.S. government clearly states that preclearance is only for paxs that go through U.S. immigration and customs in a foreign country. USVI, Guam and CNMI are not legally foreign and hence border checks on these U.S. territories are NOT preclearance. Preclearance is a privilege enjoyed by the U.S. government on foreign soil, while Federal Government enjoys such power without prior authorization on U.S. soil. They can legally set up as many passport checkpoints as they want in a border zone. C-GAUN (talk) 14:03, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

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The article title is way too long

It's clear at this point that the United States is the only country which calls this process preclearance. And the term "preclearance" is used in only two contexts in U.S. law: this context and preclearance of changes to voting procedures under the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

In general, we don't include country names in article titles when the article subject under that specific name is unique to one country and hence there is no possibility for confusion.

I propose renaming the article to Border preclearance. What do others think? --Coolcaesar (talk) 16:45, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

My argument is to rename it to USCBP Preclearance to show that it is US Customs and Border Protection running it. --OSSYULYYZ (talk) 18:03, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

I think the current name is appropriate. This is about the specific US program, not the concept in general, which is at Border_control#Prescreening, even if a different name. We should also avoid the acronym in the title. Reywas92^Talk 19:17, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

At first I was going to say you're still not reading my proposal right, but then I thought it through some more and saw the real issue. The Agreement on Land, Rail, Marine, and Air Transport Preclearance is a fully bilateral treaty. Although it is unlikely the Canadians will ever exercise their right to implement border preclearance for outbound Canada-bound traffic in U.S. ports, the existence of that treaty implies that the United States is not the only country using the term "preclearance." I suppose the current title will have to suffice for now. --Coolcaesar (talk) 16:00, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

What about transit passengers?

I think that this article should be expanded regarding the consequences for passengers who aren't travelling to the US but only have one single layover in the US, followed by a connecting flight to a third country. Let me illustrate this with an example: Let's say a Mexican national flies from Dublin to Mexico City. Itinerary is DUB-LHR-JFK-MEX. My understanding is that with this itinerary, our passenger would go through UK border controls in London. Preclearance would not occur as LHR doesn't do US preclearance. Upon arrival at JFK, US authorities would treat our passenger as a transit passenger - i. e. our passenger could just transfer from one international flight to another without the need to go through US border controls or customs. (Please correct me if I'm mistaken.) Now what happens if the itinerary of this journey is changed?¹ And by that I mean something like DUB-JFK-MEX. Now the US-bound flight leaves from a preclearance airport which means that our Mexican guy has to go through preclearance in Dublin. Now what happens to our Mexican guy when he arrives at JFK? Does he have to go through border controls again to exit the US? Also to what extent will preclearance subject our Mexican guy to US immigration laws? Can he be denied boarding on the ground that he's not allowed to travel to the US? Does he need a US visa or visa waiver? To me, it looks like preclearance can be a dangerous trap for people who are just flying to the US for a layover.
(¹There is a good reason for not travelling DUB-LHR-JFK-MEX and rebooking such a ticket: As a result of Brexit, the UK and Ireland now have different immigration rules which means that some people can only travel either country but not both. Most notable example of this are EEA citizens who can travel to Ireland with just an ID card but need a passport for the UK. At the same time, however, the UK and Ireland still have a common travel area. No border controls between the UK and Ireland. This means that if you fly from Dublin to London but London is just a layover for an international connection, you have to exit the CTA in London. This means you have to go through British border controls and you have to comply with British immigration laws. I don't know if our Mexican guy would be allowed to go through the UK; Without further reasearch, I would clearly advise against flying DUB-LHR-JFK-MEX.)
-- Dynam1te3 (talk) 13:10, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

You are mistaken, the US does not have international transfer zones. All transiting passengers must go through immigration, be it at the US airport upon arrival or via preclearance, and it won't matter which of these itineraries you choose. Reywas92^Talk 13:27, 6 September 2023 (UTC)