In 2011 we flew to Seattle then up to Juneau, crossed the border into Canada near Skagway, crossed back on the Alaska highway cruised down to Vancouver BC and flew home from there. The last port in the USA had no facilities to hand back the I94W so I looked around on the TSA website when I got home and found a contact address. I sent them my details (and my wifes) and they confirmed they knew we had departed the USA.
Given that you have to fill in your ESTA before you leave that means an electronic record has been created. The you have to submit passport number etc to the airline. Then the airline has to submit an electronic passenger list which includes passport numbers so that can be tagged to the ESTA record. Based on my experience it is my belief that the cruise line submitted a similar passenger list as we departed the USA for Vancouver BC and that was also tagged to the ESTA record showing I had departed and I see no reason why airlines don't do the same thing (i.e. submit a departure passenger list for tagging against your ESTA record).
But the cruise line handed out a piece of paper that said I had to hand in my I94W and completely failed to understand why the fact that I could see no way to do it was a problem. It seems to me that the message about electronic lists hasn't got through to the people who set up SOPs in airlines, cruise companies an the like and the US seem to have an unlimted supply of potentially misleading I94W. But then if you finally exit via a land crossing where there is no airline to submit an electronic list THEN you do need to hand in your I94W.
EDIT: No, the above is wrong. The coment about entering the USA by land woke me up. We filled in ESTA and did NOT need to fill in I94W. The problem on the cruise was that they said I HAD to have an I94W to give up. But it still remains a fact that I couldn't find a way to give up my I94W (which I didn't have but I was interested) and I contact DHS by e-mail and they confirmed we had been recorded out and the only way that could have happene would be if the cruise line told them.
Last edited by Hartington; 18th Sep 2012 at 16:38.