I have just come back from holiday this week and after landing back in Gatwick got to Passport control and when they scanned my passport the officer kept looking at the screen and me and then asked a few questions where i have been etc.
This is now the 5th time this seems to happen to me and started approx 3 years ago. It appears that when they scan my passport something comes up and then take more of an interest in me than others that I can see going through at the same time. This is only when landing back in the UK and when the passport is scanned.
Does anyone else have this or can think of a reason this may happen, or is it just a coincidence?
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https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/121650/response/300263/attach/3/FoI 23399 Johnston 01.08.12.pdf
I'm sure we could come up with a lengthy list of sensible and not so sensible suggestions about what they might be able to see. It's certainly a bit alarming that they appear to have something on you that flags you up as warranting extra attention. On the presumption that you are Mr Average - a British citizen, no criminal record, no dodgy political views or associations with any "interesting" individuals or organisations, etc, then it's very difficult to make a remotely educated guess as to what it might be. Have you been to any politically unstable destinations in the past? Have you got an unusual occupation - secret agent, importer specialising in Middle Eastern goods?
Unfortunately you'll probably never find out. Must be only a minor question mark though, otherwise they wouldn't let you through. The time to get worried is when you get to the passport desk and the officer pulls out a pair of rubber gloves and asks you step into his office!
This used to happen to my Dad whenever he came to Australia, he shared the name of someone who had skipped bail here some years before and every time he came in he would get pulled up by Customs, despite never having any kind of record himself either in the UK or here.
He used to get really pissed off by it and ended up asking the Customs guy why they kept on pulling him up and the bloke told him!
Could be worse, my work colleague is a Nigerian born Muslim with the first name of Mohammed - they kept him for 18 hours at Israeli border control once....
Have not been to any places that I think would seem strange etc.
Not overly bothered as have nothing to hide but just find it interesting.
Now before ESTAs were introduced you had to fill in those green visa waiver cards when travelling to the USA.
One of the questions on the old form was "have you ever had a visa cancelled?".
On a subsequent trip to Miami, Mrs cafcfan made the mistake of dutifully ticking the "yes" box and explaining that it was a temporary work visa that had been cancelled when she left.
The border control moron had no experience of unusual visa codes, no idea of what "cancelled without prejudice" meant and said Mrs cafcfan had a common name - the official was called Gonzales for God's sake. So, much to my amusement, she had to spend a happy couple of hours in one of those nice American wire mesh holding pens which seemed to be otherwise occupied by potential Jamaican drug mules awaiting an "intimate orifice search".
When she eventually got interrogated by someone who knew how to do their job, she got an apology and was advised never to tick yes to any of the questions unless she wanted to spend some more time with the drug mules.
As said above, probably just a name connection with someone on their "list". I manage client relationships, at a bank, for international law firms. We often have to go back for more info on transactions, if they have full or partial matches of anyone on the various global sanctions lists.
Turned out, because his passport was only a couple of months old they just wanted to do extra checks.
I don't suppose I helped the situation with my indignant British attitude - "can't you read what it says on his passport? 'Without Let or Hinderance' it says. Bloody colonials"
Probably lucky I wasn't shot to be honest.
My uncle has the same thing, we travelled together once (6 couples) and both of us went to a different line in the airport ... both of us got picked out for extra checks. Happens a lot at random police controls and football games too , and i do not even look threatening or anything.
Dont really know why, they always say that its random.
I used to have the same problem but since i moved my season ticket away from you i have not had a problem!!!
Not for the first time.