UK to introduce exit border checks
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UK to introduce exit border checks
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5212130.stm
This could have a significant effect on airport procedures.
All sorts of things. A need to segregate domestic and international pax once again. Probably the end of flight routings such as Edinburgh-Birmingham-Paris, as the pax could not be mixed on the first leg. And yet another understaffed timewasting bureaucratic procedure for everyone to queue up for (presumably crews would need to go through this for each departing leg).
And just how will the immigration controls be improved because the officers have to wear uniforms instead of suits ? Talk about fiddling while Rome burns ......
This could have a significant effect on airport procedures.
All sorts of things. A need to segregate domestic and international pax once again. Probably the end of flight routings such as Edinburgh-Birmingham-Paris, as the pax could not be mixed on the first leg. And yet another understaffed timewasting bureaucratic procedure for everyone to queue up for (presumably crews would need to go through this for each departing leg).
And just how will the immigration controls be improved because the officers have to wear uniforms instead of suits ? Talk about fiddling while Rome burns ......
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Lucifer - regarding your suggestion, what happens if a pax checkin, they scan his passport and then s/he leaves the terminal? (Yes, I can see how they'd recognise this and notify authorities, but it makes for another leaky hole).
Reintroduction of exit control sounds a good idea. Obviously there are issues, but if it worked before ....
Jordan
Reintroduction of exit control sounds a good idea. Obviously there are issues, but if it worked before ....
Jordan
As I understand it, you can't 'check-out' your passport until you are airside of security. Therefore, Jordan D, you can't do what you suggest. You have to have a very good reason for coming back through to landside and passport control would need to informed.
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the issue of uniforms is nonsense. Its not going to frighten anyone not to dodge the system. If illegals are smart enough, they will get in regardless of what the border patrol officials are wearing.
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Right after 7 July last year, they did reintroduce passport checks on departure at LHR Terminal 3 (just past security) and I think at some or all other LHR terminals, but I see that has been discontinued. Maybe that was just some sort of trial for a general reintroduction.
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of course they should reintroduce exit checks - most other countries do this.
at the moment someone can come here on a tourist or student visa, overstay their visa for 3 years, go back home for christmas and then come back and do exactly the same thing again and it would never be picked up that they had been overstaying illegally for 3 years. i've met lots of people that do that.
try that in america and you'd be banned from entering the country for 10 years.
its not that difficult to have an entry record and a corresponding departure record.
and yes - uniforms do make a difference. you only have to compare how intimidating US immigration is compared to that provided at our airports. anyone up to no good will naturally feel more nervous when faced by someone in uniform - at our airports its more like a meeting with a social worker.
at the moment someone can come here on a tourist or student visa, overstay their visa for 3 years, go back home for christmas and then come back and do exactly the same thing again and it would never be picked up that they had been overstaying illegally for 3 years. i've met lots of people that do that.
try that in america and you'd be banned from entering the country for 10 years.
its not that difficult to have an entry record and a corresponding departure record.
and yes - uniforms do make a difference. you only have to compare how intimidating US immigration is compared to that provided at our airports. anyone up to no good will naturally feel more nervous when faced by someone in uniform - at our airports its more like a meeting with a social worker.
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In the States, you keep the stub of the I-94W and hand that back in at check-in for your departure flight from the US; airline hands it to the INS. Not sure what the procedure is for straight-through routings leaving the US (are there any such routings out of the US?) but I can't see how it would be a problem for the initial check-in agent to collect it where an onward boarding pass is issued. That way, the INS knows you haven't overstayed your visa.
As for instances where the stub doesn't get handed in (eg. lost, check-in agent forgets to ask for it), from my observation the INS is pretty realistic - a boarding pass stub (either for that departure from the US, or for travel outside the US and dated after the date of departure from the US), a subsequent passport stamp (anywhere in the world) or even something like an ATM or shopping receipt clearly from outside the US is sufficient evidence that the traveller must have left the US.
As for uniforms... probably won't make a huge amount of difference but when you approach a desk with a uniformed bod, you know it's a serious matter. Approaching someone in office clothes makes it look like they've just had to pull some bods out of the office because the 'real' (ie. uniformed) border guys are either on strike or at lunch. And there may be something in the argument that people 'escaping' may think twice before trying to put one over a uniform than a nice, friendly non-uniformed agent. That is, they won't even approach the desk . Nought to hide, nought to fear.
But in these computerised days, why can't pax booking info be transferred from the airline to the UK IND? We already do it for US-bound flights, with or without a departure passport check.
As for mixing terminals - get a big red 'D' sticker on your domestic boarding pass, or 'I' for international, depending on the prevailing mix at that airport and go through the appropriate channel and get a stamp. Easy.
As for instances where the stub doesn't get handed in (eg. lost, check-in agent forgets to ask for it), from my observation the INS is pretty realistic - a boarding pass stub (either for that departure from the US, or for travel outside the US and dated after the date of departure from the US), a subsequent passport stamp (anywhere in the world) or even something like an ATM or shopping receipt clearly from outside the US is sufficient evidence that the traveller must have left the US.
As for uniforms... probably won't make a huge amount of difference but when you approach a desk with a uniformed bod, you know it's a serious matter. Approaching someone in office clothes makes it look like they've just had to pull some bods out of the office because the 'real' (ie. uniformed) border guys are either on strike or at lunch. And there may be something in the argument that people 'escaping' may think twice before trying to put one over a uniform than a nice, friendly non-uniformed agent. That is, they won't even approach the desk . Nought to hide, nought to fear.
But in these computerised days, why can't pax booking info be transferred from the airline to the UK IND? We already do it for US-bound flights, with or without a departure passport check.
As for mixing terminals - get a big red 'D' sticker on your domestic boarding pass, or 'I' for international, depending on the prevailing mix at that airport and go through the appropriate channel and get a stamp. Easy.
Last edited by Taildragger67; 25th Jul 2006 at 10:58.
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Times change, and I have to agree with Discokid. Many people have said to me that the non-uniformed immigration people in the UK mark something of our civilised approach to doing things, compared with the armed personnel on arriving in other countries, notably the US. But there's no doubt about the faintly intimidating aura of the latter.
That said, even in the US, however, they have become more rigorous on exit checks only at a few airports in recent years, and I don't think they're always tightly policed or the records always updated.
That said, even in the US, however, they have become more rigorous on exit checks only at a few airports in recent years, and I don't think they're always tightly policed or the records always updated.
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I queried the supervisor yesterday about this new procedure and was told it had been in effect for the past year (??!!), however, this was the first time I had been asked to show my passport to proceed onwards from the security area to the duty-free free-for-all area - and I've passed through major UK airports numerous times over the past year. So it looks like the "on-again-off-again" checks are "on-again".
However, the person that looked through my passport was merely going through the motions (and they DID look like a social worker, I must add...but who gives a rats what they wear...). More importantly, I have many interesting non-standard visas, etc, yet the pages were flipped so fast, the bored scrutinizer could have very well been looking through an animated "flip book"!
IF it accomplished something, maybe it would be an agreeable new procedure. However, it looks like it is yet another grand waste of H.M.'s taxes...
Mind you, it was funny to watch a Mr. Harvinder try to weasel around the queue, and try to use a vain excuse only to be put in place by the said supervisor. GET TO THE BACK OF THE QUEUE, doofus!!
Cheers,
R.D.
However, the person that looked through my passport was merely going through the motions (and they DID look like a social worker, I must add...but who gives a rats what they wear...). More importantly, I have many interesting non-standard visas, etc, yet the pages were flipped so fast, the bored scrutinizer could have very well been looking through an animated "flip book"!
IF it accomplished something, maybe it would be an agreeable new procedure. However, it looks like it is yet another grand waste of H.M.'s taxes...
Mind you, it was funny to watch a Mr. Harvinder try to weasel around the queue, and try to use a vain excuse only to be put in place by the said supervisor. GET TO THE BACK OF THE QUEUE, doofus!!
Cheers,
R.D.
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According to the BBC it will take the government 8 years. Yep EIGHT bleedin years to restate border controls to what you see in most other parts of the civilised world! They must have torn up the books and binned all the IT systems as I can't see how it can take even more than a year to get it working again. It really is a joke isn't it.
You're right we are a joke. This country is a soft touch. I have nothing against anyone entering the UK legally but our border controlls are simply inefficient. Run UK PLC as a business and we'd have been bust years ago. It's time to get things sorted, question is, who's going to do it?
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Definately think that uniforms are a must, when you see the state of some of the immigration officers, it really makes them look like a push over if they can't even dress themselves properly. The whole uniform issue automatically demands a certain respect and brings a certain status to it. Most of the way they catch people is by the way they are seen to be behaving in the queue, and anything that makes people more nervous is more likely to catch more people out.
My mate works for Immigration in T3, and when the introduced the outbound checks again, they discovered hundreds of so called asylum seekers going on holiday back to the places that they had supposedly claimed asylum from fearing for their lives or whatever cock and bull story they dreamed up. So it definately is a good idea to bring it back. I was in the aviation industry when they stopped doing checks outbound, and said then it was a terrible idea - back then it was a cost cutting excersise by the then Tory government, and look what a mess it got us into with thousands coming in, and no way of knowing if they ever left again unless they came back in.
It's about time we took a leaf out of Australia's book on who we let into the UK.
My mate works for Immigration in T3, and when the introduced the outbound checks again, they discovered hundreds of so called asylum seekers going on holiday back to the places that they had supposedly claimed asylum from fearing for their lives or whatever cock and bull story they dreamed up. So it definately is a good idea to bring it back. I was in the aviation industry when they stopped doing checks outbound, and said then it was a terrible idea - back then it was a cost cutting excersise by the then Tory government, and look what a mess it got us into with thousands coming in, and no way of knowing if they ever left again unless they came back in.
It's about time we took a leaf out of Australia's book on who we let into the UK.
Where my partner works the entire contract staff are foreign, mainly Poles and the like. They play spot the Englishman there!! I'm not joking, they told her one day that was a game they played when they were bored. Out of a staff of 25, 4 are English....why didn't we listen more closely to Enoch Powell all those years ago. And before someone flames me for being 'anti black', I'm not, I'm talking about the basis of what his speech was all about. Once foreign workers start arriving, irrespective of coloue, we would be overrun with them. he must be turning in his grave!
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why didn't we listen more closely to Enoch Powell all those years ago.
With the population forecast to start declining, I fervently believe we should encourage immigration, else the economic analyses are all pointing downwards - just like Japan. No thanks.
We are a land built of immigrants - if you are British, I mean Romans, Normans, Vikings, Scots, Germans; if you are American, I mean Europeans of every country, American Indians, Mexicans, Chinese and more.
It is only the voice of the economically priviledged, but economically ignorant who oppose immigration.
Paxing All Over The World
Lucifer Agreed. If we don't want immigrants, then we had better back track a couple of hundred years and tell them not to build up the British Empire. 
Let us not forget that we can also go and live in many other countries, as they can come to us. Sounds better than staying in a cocoon.
Let us not forget that we can also go and live in many other countries, as they can come to us. Sounds better than staying in a cocoon.