Passport Check

Greetings

If you have ever read any of my blogs you will know I like to speak about personal experiences I have had while travelling around the world, so you wont be surprised to read another one!

This particular experience did not happen to me personally but to a family member, and so I continue…………….

My sister has always dreamed about taking her children to Walt Disney World in Florida, and finally well almost finally the dream was about to come true, Hotel booked, Flights booked, Park tickets booked, ESTA Visa’s applied for and confirmed. So everything seemed to be organised and sorted…..unfortunately there was one very important element of the trip that had been overlooked. Now if only my sister had spoke to me and asked me to check out everything for her, she would now be in Florida having the time of her life with the kids, sadly she is not and instead is back home regretting the one mistake so many other people make when travelling to the US.

Yes she had thought she had ticked all the boxes, making sure all the passports  had at least 6 months validity on them from the date she got back to the UK. However she did not realise that to travel to the US all passports MUST be the chipped versions, now one very easy way to make sure you have a chipped passport is to look at the very front of your passport, under the word “Passport” you should look for a small rectangle with a circle inside, if you see this symbol then you know your passport is chipped, if you do not see this symbol, you will need to apply for a new one, IF you want to travel to the US. Sadly my sister had no idea about this new rule and only found out her huge mistake when she was at the airport checking in for her flight. To say she was devastated would be an understatement, if only she had just asked me, but hey why would she have even thought about it and I guess I should take some responsibility for not spotting it myself, although I did not book anything for her.

Anyways it has been a very hard lesson to learn, for all of us………………..

So remember, even if your passport is still valid and has a number of years before it expires, and you are travelling to the US, just make sure that the passport is the chipped version, if you see no symbol as explained above on the front of the passport, it will need to be updated before you travel to the US.

I hope this information maybe of help and save some one else’s dream holiday.

🙁