Transatlantic debarkation process?

[carolejonescjj]

Taking our first TA cruise on the Carnival Celebration next month, London to Miami. I'm looking to book my flight home from MIA and wondering if going through customs and re-entering the US takes longer than a normal, closed-loop cruise that begins and ends at the same US port. Anyone have any recent experience with this? So much has changed with face recognition technology and would love to hear from someone who has experience a cruise from a non-US port and ending in a US port over the past year. We are platinum and will be carrying off our own luggage, but want to know what to expect once we get off the boat. Trying to make an earlier flight 🙂

[CGTNORMANDIE]

4 hours ago, carolejonescjj said:

Taking our first TA cruise on the Carnival Celebration next month, London to Miami. I'm looking to book my flight home from MIA and wondering if going through customs and re-entering the US takes longer than a normal, closed-loop cruise that begins and ends at the same US port. Anyone have any recent experience with this? So much has changed with face recognition technology and would love to hear from someone who has experience a cruise from a non-US port and ending in a US port over the past year. We are platinum and will be carrying off our own luggage, but want to know what to expect once we get off the boat. Trying to make an earlier flight 🙂

Give us an idea of what time you want to exit ship and what time is your flight.  

[LHT28]

sometimes it  depends on Citizenship as well

 

Some  will take more time to clear with US Immigration than others

Will Miami be your 1st US port ?

[carolejonescjj]

7 hours ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Give us an idea of what time you want to exit ship and what time is your flight.  

I am a US citizen and a Diamond cruiser carrying off my own luggage, so I will be one of the first passengers off the ship. If the scheduled arrival is 8:00 am, what would be a "normal" time to expect to be off and through customs? I know there are a million things that can go wrong. Just want to know for the average TA arriving in Miami

[carolejonescjj]

2 hours ago, LHT28 said:

sometimes it  depends on Citizenship as well

 

Some  will take more time to clear with US Immigration than others

Will Miami be your 1st US port ?

Yes, Miami will be our first US port on the itinerary. I am a US citizen and a Diamond cruiser carrying off my own luggage, so I will be one of the first passengers off the ship. If the scheduled arrival is 8:00 am, what would be a "normal" time to expect to be off and through customs? I know there are a million things that can go wrong. Just want to know for the average TA arriving in Miami

[LHT28]

1 hour ago, carolejonescjj said:

Yes, Miami will be our first US port on the itinerary. I am a US citizen and a Diamond cruiser carrying off my own luggage, so I will be one of the first passengers off the ship. If the scheduled arrival is 8:00 am, what would be a "normal" time to expect to be off and through customs? I know there are a million things that can go wrong. Just want to know for the average TA arriving in Miami

They usually arrive earlier  but  would be cautious about booking flights before 12 noon  as you know  things can go pear shaped  😉

 

 

 FYI  a good idea  to put your Country in your profile  helps people answer  questions like this

JMO

[Heidi13]

20 hours ago, carolejonescjj said:

Taking our first TA cruise on the Carnival Celebration next month, London to Miami. I'm looking to book my flight home from MIA and wondering if going through customs and re-entering the US takes longer than a normal, closed-loop cruise that begins and ends at the same US port. Anyone have any recent experience with this? So much has changed with face recognition technology and would love to hear from someone who has experience a cruise from a non-US port and ending in a US port over the past year. We are platinum and will be carrying off our own luggage, but want to know what to expect once we get off the boat. Trying to make an earlier flight 🙂

 

We have experienced this in a number of ports and they often have queues for US/Canadian citizens, which move fairly quickly. The queues for other citizens move much slower as they check Visas and take finger prints/photos.

 

[CGTNORMANDIE]

18 hours ago, carolejonescjj said:

I am a US citizen and a Diamond cruiser carrying off my own luggage, so I will be one of the first passengers off the ship. If the scheduled arrival is 8:00 am, what would be a "normal" time to expect to be off and through customs? I know there are a million things that can go wrong. Just want to know for the average TA arriving in Miami

Right…and what time is your flight?

[FlaMariner]

We have never disembarked in Miami after a TA but we have disembarked from Port Everglades after two TA's.  One was after the unpleasantness.

 

We've found the process and timeline no different than a regular 7 night Caribbean milk run.

 

(And we always do early disembarkation and are at FLL or the FLL Amtrak station by 8:20am)

[ysolde]

Our first TA was on the Encore's maiden voyage in November 2019.  Disembarkation was a bit of a disaster.  We went through customs and immigration the night before we disembarked, meaning we had the thrill of arriving in NYC (which was absolutely amazing), only to rush back to our cabin and pack so that we could make a dinner reservation we had managed to re-book for an earlier time (given the new circumstance of everyone needing to leave the ship to clear customs that night).  We went to what was supposed to be a romantic final dinner in the ship's French restaurant, only to have to rush through the meal as groups were being called to clear customs every 20 minutes or so.  

 

We then headed downstairs to clear customs ourselves and it was a madhouse.  There were not enough USCIS officers at that time in the evening to clear the number of passengers who were debarking (and re-boarding) the ship.  People stood in endless lines.  One elderly gentleman collapsed.  A few people who had small children and did not want to go to bed this late only to wake them up early in the morning, chose to disembark that night.

 

Actual disembarkation was the next morning, and involved nothing more than exiting the ship, picking up your luggage, and getting in a cab/Lyft to wherever you were going,  I'm not sure if they were trying a new disembarkation process or what, but it was far from smooth, and it did not work well.