View From The Wing
Date: December 24, 2020
By: Gary Leff
Taiwan has asked the U.S. government to set up immigration preclearance center at the Taipei Taoyua airport. And it’s not for the reason that many travelers assume. It turns out Taiwan wants U.S. immigration preclearance for the same reason frequent flyer award seats and fare deals are going to be easily available on flights between the U.S. and Taipei for quite awhile.
U.S. Immigration preclearance means you clear immigration and customers at your departure airport, before getting on the plane, rather than when you arrive in the U.S. This way you get off at your destination city in the U.S. as though you had been on a domestic flight.
There are currently preclearance airports in
- Dublin and Shannon, Ireland
- Aruba
- Freeport and Nassau, Bahamas
- Bermuda
- Abu Dhabi
- Calgary, Toronto, Edmonton, Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver, Victoria, and Winnipeg in Canada