View Full Version : Profiling ... no checked luggage, paid cash ...
I've been thinking about recent threads on how security could be improved and I keep coming back to the suggestion that various black hats could have been caught, if only they had noticed that they had no checked luggage and had paid cash for their ticket.
Now, I'm traveling to Washington in a week or so, for a two hour meeting (NO - DON'T ASK), I'll arrive, go to a hotel, sleep, go to the meeting, go shopping, visit some friends, head to the airport, and leave.
No, I won't check a bag. And my ticket, paid by someone else, is being issued by a travel agent. The ticket says "Agent/Invoice" which is correct - and while not exactly cash could be the same thing.
Now I'm confused. Here are two 'obvious' indications of black-hat activity, however I am completely innocent. Will I withstand the rubber gloves of outrageous fortune ... Or are these things only an urban myth?
Hartington
2nd Feb 2010, 20:55
I'd never thought of it in those terms. In the travel agent/airline relationship there are only two kinds of payment "credit" (covers plastic in all forms and a few specialised forms) and "cash" (everything else). As you say therefore even though the ticket has the words Agent/Invoice it has an underlying connotation of cash. However, did you know that if the agent accepts a credit card and banks it himself he has to pay the airline so that is "cash" and the ticket might well say "Agent/Invoice". "Credit" in this context refers to the practice of the agent collecting the card number and passing it to the airline so that the airline can collect the money itself.
However, I strongly suspect that the reports of terrorists paying for tickets in cash mean preciesly that - notes and coins. In which case where your ticket says "Agent/Invoice" theirs will say "Cash".
Mind you quite where that leaves you I'm not totally sure but you do have one thing on your side - a round trip ticket.
davidjohnson6
2nd Feb 2010, 21:12
If I wanted to blow up a plane and had spent both money and time training in Yemen / Afghanistan / Pakistan / latest secret hideout..... why would I be stupid enough to pay cash for a one-way ticket, now that it's common knowledge is considered a warning signal for various security agencies ?
If you have a plan to do things the police will do almost anything to stop - then it seems sensible to avoid giving the police warning of such activity.
boredcounter
3rd Feb 2010, 01:21
Who will fill it in?
Well, let's see ...
In my case I believe that the purchaser will pay the agent through a bank transfer, fairly common here. No 'cash' per-se but he could have taken a wad of cash down to the post office and settled the invoice there. The post-office wouldn't blink an eye at a few thousand being paid over the counter.
In much of the world credit is unusual. What's the credit card penetration rate in Africa, or in India? Mind you I was surprised that the undie-bomber didn't use one of his daddy issued credit cards. Perhaps he was cut off but I'd be surprised if he didn't have plastic (W. Europe resident). And why did he buy a one-way ticket, I'm sure he could have got a RT for the same, or less money. Not to save money (why would he care) but to generate less suspicion.
Yes, I do have a round trip ticket (in Club) and that makes me less risky because ...
APIS? BA has my passport information which I filled in on-line.
So, I guess we can remove these two things from the list of things to look out for ...
Hartington
3rd Feb 2010, 16:30
APIS - Advance Passenger Information System - it's how airlines send passenger data to the US authorities.
More importantly have you completed ESTA?! https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/
I have one of the few passports that don't require ESTA. No, not US, but a little further north ....
Hartington
3rd Feb 2010, 21:41
I'm so used to reminding UK friends about it I'd omitted to allow for the possibility. Sorry.
TightSlot
4th Feb 2010, 06:51
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c57/TightSlot/canada.gif
Go Canada!
What about the LOCO's that are using swingeing charges to actively discourage passengers from checking bags?
The last LOCO I used specified only one carry-on piece. So I packed everything, laptop and all, into my industry standard 'wheelie' only to have to unpack it all again for the security check.
I wasn't best pleased to find that many of my fellow passengers carried more than on bag onto the aircraft anyway with no reaction one way or the other from the gate staff.
Hartington, no worries I wasn't clear on that point.
But it does demonstrate the silliness of the US system ...
The largest single country of origin for visitors to the US doesn't need visas nor do they have to go through the "I'm not a member of the communist party" palaver either on line or on green pieces of paper. They don't even need machine readable passports (although there aren't many left that haven't expired). Biometric passports are not required.
Most of their other friends (Visa Waiver countries) can, mostly, avoid getting a visa but do have to go through the palaver on line and fill out the green pieces of paper which have identical (silly) questions. Biometric passports are required.
Everyone else needs a Visa, so they give the undie-bomber an unlimited mutiple-entry visa, and didn't cancel it when he became suspicious. He, no doubt, did the on-line bit.