Cfrgtkky

Most airlines these days offer online checkin, complete with digital boarding passes downloaded to your phone. However, on international flights, you're often -- but not always -- required to go to airport check-in anyway, so they can scan/sight/confirm your passport and any necessary visas. This is separate from the final ticket vs ID check at the gate, and if you try to skip it, frantic paging before boarding starts will ensue.

So simple question: How do I know whether I need to detour to get my passport checked?

In my experience it varies a lot how is it organized.

The patterns I experienced so far were:

1. Online check–in not available.


2. Online check–in doesn't issue boarding pass.


3. Online check–in issues boarding pass and instruction to visit airport check-in.


4. Person checks boarding pass before entry to security area and asks to visit check-in.


5. Gate announces for my name some time before boarding and checks passport.


6. Person checks my passport during boarding (separate step from boarding procedure itself).

In a nutshell if you need your passport checked then it will happen at some point, but there is a lot of variety in how it can be set up, depending on airline and airport.

So unless you are already familiar with specific airline/airport procedure you probably can't guess how is it going to be.

If airline had issued you a boarding pass and hadn't explicitly informed you they would prefer you to still visit ariport check–in, that’s their problem.

If you have a boarding pass (whether that was obtained via online check-in or via a kiosk at the airport), then you can skip the check-in counter completely and head straight to security/immigration.

If there is a need for them to sight your passport (eg, to check you have the required visas) then one of two things will happen :

1) You will not be allowed to check-in online, or you will be allow check-in, but you will not be issued with a boarding pass. In these cases you'll need to go via the check-in counter at the airport before you can head to security/immigration.

2) They will check your passport/documents at or near the gate. This could occur either as you approach the gate area, before boarding commences by them calling you by name to the podium, or as you are boarding the flight.

When I check in online my boarding pass (Delta) usually says "INTL - Verify PASSPORT" at the top if the passport needs checking, or DOCS-OK if not. They will frequently give me a replacement boarding pass with DOCS-OK once it is checked, but I also have one with a "Checked" stamp across it instead.

Checking in with my passport and boarding card when I get to the gate counter has always worked, but yes, they will page you to visit the gate counter agent prior to starting boarding if you don't do it yourself. On the other hand, if my boarding pass doesn't have either statement (other airlines) I've never had a problem with just approaching the gate agent and asking "do you need to check my passport?" - but do be sensitive to how busy they are.

You don't.

If flying to an APIS destination, and you are issued a boarding pass, you will not have to check-in again because you are already checked-in.

The boarding pass will get you all the way to the gate where the spot check of your passport will occur as usual.

In rare cases, you might be issued a gate pass to get you through screening but unless you're OK to board, no one wants you actually in the terminal.

I imagine it's possible for some uncommon nexus where it's easier to issue a BP and check at the gate.