pantonia
Difficulty:  | Review Topic: Port of Entry Review
It all went very smoothly.
I had read that they were a little unprofessional and unorganized and that some people even took 4 hours to go through it, so I was worried the 3 hours I had to connect to my DFW flight weren't gonna be enough.
I arrived at 5.30 am at the airport and I rushed to immigration to be the first one of my flight to go through it. I was lucky that there were no passengers from other flights already waiting. I asked which line to go and they told me to go the American citizen's line (along with other people who had work visas and immigration visas).
The guy there was very nice and realized I didn't have the customs form (the plane crew of my flight didn't hand them out and I forgot I was gonna need it). He luckily had one lying there and I filled it quickly right there.
After he checks your passport and stuff, they usually tell you to stand by the wall and wait for someone to take you to a room, but he was going on a break so he walked me to the room himself.
In that room there was just one other guy around who seemed to be waiting for something else for a long time and I sat down.
Processing the sealed envelope takes about 10 min, but at that hour there was just 1 clerk on the counters, so he had to stop and handle other stuff before getting back to my envelope (every now and then people would come in, he'd take their passport, do something and quickly give them back and send them to pick up their luggage and go on about their day).
At some point a woman came in and asked for my luggage ticket nr, so that they would claim it themselves and hold it for me until I was done with immigration.
She had a brief conversation with the guy who was waiting around and I found out that if you happen to miss your connection flight because you are stuck waiting in that room, then your airline (in this case it was American, but it sounded like all did the same) would just put you on the next flight available to your destination, no charge.
After a while, the man on the counter finished my paperwork, handed me my passport and instructed on what the process after POE (get married withing 90 days, AOS, etc...) and showed me on where to go next to claim my luggage.
I walked a few steps when I realized that the paper card he had stapled on my passport had my last name misspelled. I got back in the room and the guy quickly fixed it (He said it had been only his mistake when writing it down, and that all my official paperwork was written ok, so not to worry).
Everyone I talked to who worked at the airport was Latino, so they all talked to me in spanish and were pretty friendly.
After that, I just picked up my luggage and went on to board my connection flight. The whole process, once inside the immigration room took about 30 min.
|
Port of Entry Member Review #16088
Entry Date: 2016-02-27