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Comment by Taniwha | Hacker News Reader

but when you apply for an ESTA you get told you've been 'approved' - you use this as a basis for booking a flight and travelling, if they're going to take it back without telling you (they have your email address) that really sucks, kind of passive aggressive

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They don't seem to do the check when you apply. Years ago I fat-fingered my passport number, the ESTA went through fine, but I was refused at the airport due to my typo.

I had to make a new one on the spot, was no problem, but it seems that they will just approve the ESTA when applying for it, and then later refuse you if they want.

They sometimes check. My last two ESTA renewals took 1 day because of some manual checks. Went through in the end. Know others who had the same experience so I guess they are performing some background checks.

It'd be very funny if all of this boils down to him having a typo entering his info.

So the lesson is apply for ESTA as late as possible?

ESTA does not tell you you're "approved" -- it simply tells you whether or not you are in one of the eligible populations for visa-free entry to the US. Nothing in ESTA guarantees you'll be allowed into the US, or even to board your plane.

It literally tells you

> Your travel authorization has been approved and you are authorized to travel to the United States under the Visa Waiver Program.

It then goes on to say (but this is the same for visas as well):

> This does not guarantee admission to the United States; a Customs and Border protection (CBP) officer at a port of entry will have the final determination.

I'm not disagreeing that the web page says that. But what it says is terrible inaccurate wording. ESTA simply determines whether you're someone who is, in general, eligible for visa-free travel (which is primarily determined by your country of citizenship -- everything else involved in ESTA is secondary to that). It doesn't grant a visa or guarantee anything about being allowed in.

Australia uses an almost-identical system (IIRC the US one is based on Australia's).

An ESTA can be denied and there are checks in place. The approval process can sometimes take a day or more. So it's not just checking if you are eligible, they also determine if they assume that you would be granted entry to the country. Since it's valid for 2 years there can obviously be changes after you've been granted the ESTA.

But what the web page says is exactly what the parent comment complained about. Saying "you are free to travel" and then, without notifying you, deny you boarding is not a nice thing to do (even if it happens for a very valid reason). It just shows the careless attitude of whoever designed that system.

You are saying: "But the webpage said this!"

I am saying: "I agree with you that the webpage said this. The webpage should not say that, because that is not accurate or useful."

In your pursuit of antagonizing someone who agreed with you, you have now devolved into trying to nitpick details of a program you clearly don't actually understand, so I'd suggest you just accept that when I said I agreed with you that the wording was bad I did in fact mean it, and stop now.

Not accurate or useful would be an apt description of your comments here.

> but when you apply for an ESTA you get told you've been 'approved'

FWIW, the last esta before the current one was not immediately approved for me. I did however get a mail after a while that it was approved and i get consistently mailed a month before it expires.

The whole ESTA application system is horrid.

If your approval isn't immediate (mine wasn't) then you have to keep checking back to see if/when it gets approved - they don't email you.

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