Has anyone applied for GOES/TSA pre check?

[cransplash]

DH and I are flying 3x in the next 4 months (I likely will be flying 4x). My friend just told me about applying for TSA Pre Check and GOES (global online enrollment system).

DH and I applied for GOES, and our app is conditionally approved. We set up our appt for the interview, but had some questions:

1. How long is the interview? Does it go in depth?
2. My interview is on 10/23 (DH is on 11/5), and our next flight is on 11/8. Will I get my TSA pre check # in time?
3. Is it worth it?

[iammalcolmx]

1. How long is the interview? 5 minutes Does it go in depth? No, they ask where you have been in the past few years, have you been convicted of a crime, what keeps you traveling so much.
2. My interview is on 10/23 (DH is on 11/5), and our next flight is on 11/8. Will I get my TSA pre check # in time? Yes it will, you will get your trusted traveler number electronically in that system you used to see your approval and schedule your interview. Once you get this number put it in your airline reservation and your Pre-check and/or global entry will show up on your boarding pass.  Also if you keep checking in the mornings you should be able to schedule your appointment sooner.
3. Is it worth it?Hell TO THE YEAH. OMG that Pre-check has been delightful in multiple airports and being pre-checked through customs is a thing of beauty. It's the best 100.00 I ever spent!!

[mdgirl]

1. I think it took about 10 minutes, and did not go in depth. However we both tried to get the first appointments of the day because we heard they tend to run behind a lot.

2. Well, you're never guaranteed to get Pre-Check for any flight, but you should get your number. Whether it registers when you actually check in for your flight I think can vary (and this might have improved). I think it's considered best to enter the number when you make the reservation/have it in your mileage account profiles.

3. It's so awesome. It's not as a big of a deal in some airports, but we just flew out of Honolulu last Sunday and avoided standing in the longest security line I've seen in years thanks to Pre-Check (which had 0 line).

[Deleted]

1. How long is the interview? mine lasted all of 7 minutes, H's lasted about 4. (We had the same guy and the guy pretty much said to H, I just talked to your wife, so I already got a lot of my questions answered from her.) Does it go in depth? Nope, pretty much just a quick overview of the answers in your application.
2. My interview is on 10/23 (DH is on 11/5), and our next flight is on 11/8. Will I get my TSA pre check # in time? When we did it in 2012 we got it on the spot. I imagine it's still the same. 
3. Is it worth it? Best $100 I've spent. 

[cransplash]

Thanks for the advice. I decided to give it a try this morning, and there were some open slots for 10/21?!?!
Anyways, I rescheduled for DH and I.

Thanks again!

[v]

1. How long is the interview? Does it go in depth? Not at all in-depth.  I don't think I actually was asked a question except for travel plans.  Then the guy talked to me about how the program works, talked to me about travel (he likes to travel too) and showed me a picture of his daughter who has the same first name as me.  This whole thing took like 10 minutes, but most of that was chatting.


2. My interview is on 10/23 (DH is on 11/5), and our next flight is on 11/8. Will I get my TSA pre check # in time?  Yup.  You'll get your number that day and can start adding it to your airline accounts then (but from what I understand, even if you don't have the number added to your accounts you can use Global Entry but not pre-check).

3. Is it worth it?  Yes.  A hundred times yes!

[orangello]

I think, however (I could be wrong) that you have to have your known traveler # in your airline account when you book your ticket in order to have pre-check on your boarding pass. At least, that seems to be how it's worked for me (I'm the dunce who didn't realize that you had to add the # to your traveler profile...couldn't figure out why I was never getting pre-check).

Am I wrong? I know you can use Global Entry as soon as your interview is over.

[shellfish26]

Oct 9, 2014 10:05:36 GMT -5 orangello said:

I think, however (I could be wrong) that you have to have your known traveler # in your airline account when you book your ticket in order to have pre-check on your boarding pass. At least, that seems to be how it's worked for me (I'm the dunce who didn't realize that you had to add the # to your traveler profile...couldn't figure out why I was never getting pre-check).

Am I wrong? I know you can use Global Entry as soon as your interview is over.

That was our experience as well.  We had one trip that was already booked before we received our KTN.  We had success in calling the airline to have them add the number so that it appeared on our boarding passes.

[ohyouknow]

If you get the American Express Platinum card, you get Pre-Check free. Granted, it's a $450 annual fee, but you also get all kinds of free airport lounge access and other awesome stuff.

[v]

Oct 9, 2014 10:05:36 GMT -5 orangello said:

I think, however (I could be wrong) that you have to have your known traveler # in your airline account when you book your ticket in order to have pre-check on your boarding pass. At least, that seems to be how it's worked for me (I'm the dunce who didn't realize that you had to add the # to your traveler profile...couldn't figure out why I was never getting pre-check).

Am I wrong? I know you can use Global Entry as soon as your interview is over.

Not anymore!  My husband and I went to Canada a few weeks ago and I was so mad when I found out a few days before the trip that he had never updated his KTN in his United account.  He added it probably 3 days before we travelled (and months after the ticket was booked) and he got pre-check.

It has to be in there in advance of the trip (so the airline can run your travel by the TSA, I believe), but not at time of booking.

For Global Entry it apparently doesn't need to be there at all.

But still, it is a very, very good idea to put the number in all of your airline online accounts as soon as you get it so you never forget and don't have to worry about it.

[mich1]

Interesting that the interview is different for Global Entry than it is for NEXUS. My interview lasted roughly 40 minutes or so and I was interviewed by both US and Canadian immigration officials. I wonder how much of it was that I lived in KY and went for my interview in Champlain, NY.

Like with others, I add the number to the ticket when I book it.

[GilliC]

Oct 9, 2014 18:51:15 GMT -5 mich1 said:

Interesting that the interview is different for Global Entry than it is for NEXUS. My interview lasted roughly 40 minutes or so and I was interviewed by both US and Canadian immigration officials. I wonder how much of it was that I lived in KY and went for my interview in Champlain, NY.

Like with others, I add the number to the ticket when I book it.

I live in Norway and did my Global Entry interview in Newark during a layover., and it was still only 10 minutes. They took my biometrics, showed me the "how to use the kiosk" video, checked a few documents, and asked if I had any questions. I assumed most of the work was done behind the scenes running my name through databases, and the "interview" was just to collect my fingerprints and verify that I was a real person.

[WinterWine]

Oct 9, 2014 18:51:15 GMT -5 mich1 said:

Interesting that the interview is different for Global Entry than it is for NEXUS. My interview lasted roughly 40 minutes or so and I was interviewed by both US and Canadian immigration officials. I wonder how much of it was that I lived in KY and went for my interview in Champlain, NY.

Like with others, I add the number to the ticket when I book it.

I also did Nexus and my appointment lasted about an hour. (Part of the length was probably that I was in grad school and had a million different addresses in the past 6 years). Regardless, best money ever spent. If you can save yourself even one horrid line, it will be worth it!

[mich1]

Oct 10, 2014 19:16:53 GMT -5 WinterWine said:

Oct 9, 2014 18:51:15 GMT -5 mich1 said:

Interesting that the interview is different for Global Entry than it is for NEXUS. My interview lasted roughly 40 minutes or so and I was interviewed by both US and Canadian immigration officials. I wonder how much of it was that I lived in KY and went for my interview in Champlain, NY.

Like with others, I add the number to the ticket when I book it.

I also did Nexus and my appointment lasted about an hour. (Part of the length was probably that I was in grad school and had a million different addresses in the past 6 years). Regardless, best money ever spent. If you can save yourself even one horrid line, it will be worth it!

Glad to know I was not imagining the length of my interview.  I didn't have a lot of addresses, but was living in KY when I applied and that may have thrown up a red flag to them.

At the time, I was in a LDR with a Canadian who lived and worked near the border in the US.  I was up here at least once/mo and we were always going over the border.  The first time we sat for 120 minutes trying to get through at Peace Arch, I applied.  Thinking back, I probably got questioned more about my relationship than anything.

[babsbunny]

Tip - You will get your GOES card in the mail a few weeks after the interview. This is a government issued photo ID, so you can use it as such, like when you show your boarding pass and ID at the TSA line.

Global Entry and TSA PreCheck do not prevent you from normal secondary screening if you get the dreaded SSSSS on your boarding pass, which DH and I got recently, most likely due to having the airline reduce our layover which made the reservation system think we had just bought one-way tickets to the US less than 24 hours before departure.

In just the half dozen times I've gotten to use it, I've found the people in the TSA PreCheck line to be more pleasant.

[cransplash]

Update- we just had our interview yesterday and all went well.

Question- I can't seem to find any info on this. We had booked 3 different flights (nov, dec, and feb 2015) but didn't get our KTN until yesterday. I updated all our flight logins with our KTN but will our KTN be printed on our boarding passes? Or did we need our KTN to already be on our our accts at the time of booking?

[iammalcolmx]

Oct 22, 2014 9:35:38 GMT -5 cransplash said:

Update- we just had our interview yesterday and all went well.

Question- I can't seem to find any info on this. We had booked 3 different flights (nov, dec, and feb 2015) but didn't get our KTN until yesterday. I updated all our flight logins with our KTN but will our KTN be printed on our boarding passes? Or did we need our KTN to already be on our our accts at the time of booking?

The update should work fine.

[frlcb]

I just went this morning for our goes appt with my 6 and 3 year olds in Atlanta and all 3 of us were in and out in less than 10 minutes, so easy

[seabitch]

Oct 22, 2014 9:37:30 GMT -5 iammalcolmx said:

Oct 22, 2014 9:35:38 GMT -5 cransplash said:

Update- we just had our interview yesterday and all went well.

Question- I can't seem to find any info on this. We had booked 3 different flights (nov, dec, and feb 2015) but didn't get our KTN until yesterday. I updated all our flight logins with our KTN but will our KTN be printed on our boarding passes? Or did we need our KTN to already be on our our accts at the time of booking?

The update should work fine.

I updated my number two days before the flight and it was on my boarding pass.  You should be good!

[cransplash]

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I can't seem to find this info online.

When we traveled last weekend, we had our boarding passes printed on paper and our KTN# was printed on there. If we were to use our Delta app, will the KTN# be on the app so we can access the TSA pre check line?

Also:
I LOVE TSA pre check. OMG, you guys were right. BEST money ever spent. Before our trip with TSA pre check, DH was all "are you sure it is worth $100 GOES fee? We're essentially paying for a shorter line and convenience". We didn't have to remove anything from our bags, didn't have to take off our shoes, belt, wallet, or watch. Didn't have to take out our electronics nor our liquids. We are usually trying to quickly take our shoes off while trying to fanagle 3 bins each b/c electronics, liquids, and wallet/belt/shoes. Just to be able to get through without that hassle AND the TSA pre check line was NO LINE (while the regular line was 5 rows deep) was GLORIOUS. DH was convinced it was awesome.
Thank you, thank you, thank you travel board for convincing me.

[osumelissa]

I imagine the boarding pass on the phone has the same info as paper. However I am old fashioned and like paper and won't use a mobile boarding pass

[iammalcolmx]

The phone boarding pass shows pre check as well

[mdgirl]

It should. This is my boarding pass from the United app for tomorrow.