THE EDITOR: Something about the final leg heading across the Gulf of Paria, seeing the capital on my left and seeing the highways busy with traffic always gets me. In my head I’m always hearing David Michael Rudder’s Song For a Lonely Soul.
That is, right up until I have to go through the immigration process. Let’s ignore for a moment, the typical drama of how many officers are present and the length of the line. I want to focus the pieces of self carbon paper that we have to fill out.
Over a decade ago we transitioned to machine-readable passports presumably to smooth our travel experience into other airports. Apparently not our own. Yes they do scan our passport at immigration, but why is it that everywhere else the information about how long I’m gonna be there and where I live etc is already received, but when we come home, we have to spell all that (stuff) out?
I fly into Houston and after the immigration process I collect my bags and I practically give a high five to the customs agents as I leave to get my Uber to leave.
Somehow when I come home I have to be interrogated about information that I’ve already put on the paper form (which apparently no one is reading) only to still be put through the scanner when I clearly joined the green line because I had nothing to declare.
The red line with something to declare is always conspicuously empty and fully staffed. Why is this experience so different from other places?
Back to immigration. Where are the automated immigration kiosks?? I mean, if the kiosks work, wouldn’t that alleviate some of the burden on the immigration staff and improve their overall efficiency and job satisfaction? The passports are machine readable you know. Just saying.
That last segment on the paper form. If I live here, why de a** do I have to fill that out? Don’t you dare try using your brain and not fill that part out! You will be punished into standing there and filling out a slip of paper that adds absolutely zero value to the process.
You have arrived home. You are not departing soon. The next time you are leaving, they will give you a fresh piece of paper to fill out anyway. Seriously, what are we accomplishing here??
So after this rant, what I want to know is whether the Ministry of Digital Transformation has this as their top priority to solve? After all, Barbados has sorted this out since 2021.
EDWARD BRATHWAITE
Consultant
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