Travellers at Montreal's airport frustrated as U.S. app lets users cut ...
Montreal
Travellers flying to the United States are taking advantage of U.S. Customs mobile app to get through airports on time, but people without it — those without the app or who aren't American or Canadian — are facing delays and cancellations.
Joe Bongiorno · CBC News
· Posted: Jul 14, 2023 4:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 6 hours ago
Amber Jonas flew to her hometown of Montreal to celebrate her birthday with family. When she went to Pierre-Elliott-Trudeau International Airport to fly back to her home in New York City, she made sure to arrive three hours in advance, more than enough time to catch her flight with Air Canada — or so she thought.
That's when her travel plans hit some turbulence.
Jonas and her husband, a French national with a U.S. work visa, stood in line at customs, waiting as other passengers using a Mobile Passport Control (MPC) application — a free app from United States Customs and Border Protection to speed up wait time at customs for American citizens and Canadian visitors — passed in front of them.
Jonas says she was told she could download the app and go through, but she did not want to leave without her husband and her dog.
"The longer we waited … the farther back we got, and it didn't make any sense," she said.
About two and a half hours later, they finally made it through customs — too late to catch their flight.
They were not alone.
Jonas says about 15 people missed the flight, mostly elderly travellers and people from different countries.
Now, some like Jonas are rethinking their travel plans and worrying about the impact the app will have on international and elderly travellers flying to the United States from Montreal.
Susan Li was also supposed to be on the same flight to New York City.
She flew to Montreal for the weekend on holiday, and although she says she enjoyed her trip, she isn't sure if she will return after her experience at the airport.
Without a Canadian or American passport, she had to wait in line, but quickly noticed that travellers with MPC and Nexus passes were moving ahead of her.
Two hours later, she missed her flight.
"That was just really unfair," said Li. "It was a very long, frustrating, inconvenient, uncomfortable day."
When it comes to air travel border controls, mobile technologies like the MPC app are a sign of things to come, but while the app and others like it may streamline the process for some travellers, it will leave others behind, according to John Gradek, a lecturer and the co-ordinator of the Aviation Management Program at McGill University.
"If you are not up to speed with mobile technology and you're not comfortable with mobile technology, we have a problem, and that's what's happening today with MPC," he said, adding that seniors in particular are mostly negatively affected.
According to Gradek, border service agencies must pay greater attention to how their prioritization of app users affects travellers.
"It really is up to the agency that's using this technology to make sure that there is no discrimination in terms of people waiting," he said. "In my opinion, it really is a discriminatory policy."
According to Aéroports de Montréal (ADM), United States Customs and Border Protection is responsible for managing customs and processing passengers flying to the U.S.
ADM told CBC it is a busy time of the year for air travel, which means security checks can sometimes take longer than usual.
The MPC and NEXUS programs are designed to expedite the border clearance process and therefore it is "only natural, then, that waiting times should be shorter for users of these services," Eric Forest, ADM communications advisor said in a statement.
United States Customs and Border Protection declined to comment.
Joe Bongiorno is an author, former high school teacher and a journalist at the CBC. He has also reported for Canadian Geographic, Maisonneuve, Canada’s National Observer and others. You can reach him at [email protected].
with files from Rowan Kennedy
