I’ve been hearing for a while that TSA’s budget has been shrinking. I found the following with a little googling. I won’t comment on the budget cuts and blame game as that would get political.
“From 2010 to 2015, TSA’s overall budget decreased when adjusted for inflation, while the number of passengers flying each year increased. The cap on the number of full-time screeners that TSA employs has gone down over that time period as well.” The NYT says screeners have declined by 12% since 2011 while passengers have increased by 12%.
Probably another factor is bag-check fees. People are bringing more luggage onboard (and thus through security) to avoid bag fees. I remember in the years immediately after 9-11 there was a huge decline in people with carry-on’s (I remember thinking how remarkable it was how empty the overhead bins were), but that trend definitely reversed strongly when airlines cranked up the bag fees.
“Probably another factor is bag-check fees. People are bringing more luggage onboard (and thus through security) to avoid bag fees.”
This!! I was shocked to see how little people carried with them onboard the two flights we took to and from Europe. The security checkpoints for international airlines in Stockholm were moving very quickly. Most airlines flying out of that part of the terminal allowed at least one checked bag.
as was mentioned before …a paid option to get to the front of the line at a limited number of airports… https://www.clearme.com/#what-is-clear
and not at all terminals in the airports they serve.
^^^CLEAR is only found in terminal E at DFW. I’ve never flown out of that terminal ever, so I don’t know that this would be helpful to me at all.
I see United flies out of Terminal E. We almost always fly American, but we are flying United for the first time ever in August for our Quebec trip. Still, I don’t see us flying United on a regular basis, so it would just be cheaper to get there early for this one trip.
Nrdbs4 I agree it is of very limited value to a small group of people. not sure if it is worth it. I have seen at an airport a a private check in with frosted glass area with a guy dressed like a doorman at the check in counter. it was next to first class check in. I asked the ticket counter person what that was and he said it is for beyond first class service with special benefits from arrival to departure. (not sure what those people get. Maybe they are escorted directly to the plane and off the plane to a car on the runway with their bags waiting?)
We have been randomly getting TSA precheck pretty frequently. I just got a Delta skymiles credit card and they assigned me a new skymiles #. I have been able to get them to merge the skymiles accounts and keep the one with the long history as my primary account, but I will be bummed if I don’t get precheck on our flight in a few days.
I have been curious about Clear as well. We have it where we live. They are always trying to sign people up when the lines are long—when BOTH precheck and regular lines are long.
The way I look at it it’s just another way of fleecing ordinary people. Why can’t we expect to get through the line withing a reasonable amount of time? Isn’t it the gov job? We pay tax, we took off shoes, we even show our underwear. Isn’t that enough? Now we have to pay if we don’t want to miss our flight?
iglooo
security theater does not make flying any safer. the entire security process can be streamlined. most people line up like sheep and never question it…it is for your “safety” !
My understanding from someone who works in the industry is that the random Precheck has to do with markers such as age, sex, and other demographic indicators and not frequent flyer status. I’ve seen plenty of people who have gotten random TSA Precheck who didn’t have a clue on how to deal with the security line at all.
I have global entry, so I have been getting TSA precheck almost every time. I flew out of JFK yesterday, I was through in less than 10 min. The regular line was moving pretty fast without a long line.
With TSA precheck you don’t have to take off shoes or coat, but a lot of people still do and they do hold up the line.
I have TSA precheck and I got through security in exactly 4 minutes at JFK. (I was going on an international flight). The $85 was completely worth it for me.
“It was my impression that the random assignment into PreCheck has been discontinued for security reasons.”
it was discontinued because the people who made appointments to get finger printed and paid for pre tsa got really pissed. randomly giving people pre check will not make air travel any less safe.
I just got random PreCheck both ways earlier this month. I think they give it to me because I’m traveling with my husband, who is registered for PreCheck.
^ I do think that happens a lot (passengers w/o PreCheck get it if they’re traveling with some who have it).
We had our Global Entry interviews earlier this month (a long wait, AND Portland does not take walk-ins AT ALL, AND we have to drive two hours to get there. So much argh for a five minute process. But we’re done!).
Most bad lines and bad press was in mid-May and it seems that the new TSA agents have been posted in the places where it was the worst (NYC, ATL). Our trip last week was pretty easy. We’re lucky (in a way; in others not so much) that we often fly out of podunk cities and into podunk cities. There are never long lines in Eugene lol.
We’re looking forward to seeing how Global Entry works for us when we go to France and Croatia in Sept. Though the kiosks were available to non-GE passengers last summer when we came back to the US from Fiji via LAX. They really did speed things up a bit.
Flew to Europe in early June - family of 4, did not feel like paying $300 and change for precheck - also know someone who got it in my area and it was a 6-hour wait. All of us were randomly assigned to precheck and through security in 5 minutes. The staff were telling us to hurry up! They don’t want to get back in the papers! It was great, except that we had gotten to the airport over 4 hours before our flight because of the publicity over 3-hour security lines. We spent a lot of time shopping in JFK. Oh, and I had time to discover the pet restroom at JFK, complete with fake grass and a fake fire hydrant!