JFK connection time - 1hr 50mins

[Burgmeister]

Originally Posted by sarahb161

Ah right that’s good to know! So it’s more of a “travelled with ANY previous ESTA before” line, than a “travelled on your current ESTA before line”?! That will help immensely!

See more...

Yes, exactly.

[elle573]

We flew via JFK back in Oct 2016 with three kids in tow.They were 9y, 5y and 3 months. We had an hour and 50 mins transfer time. I was dreading it but it was really easy, we were sat at our gate with time to spare but everything run on time etc. We were sat in the bulkhead seat near the front of economy and I would prebook your seats as near as you can. We were off the plane in front of most people and this helped.
We will be looking at this route again when we go next year.

[macadoo]

It might be tight but I would book a 1 hour 50 connection at jfk. We’ve been twice (staying in New York) and both times been out the airport within 45 mins and security on the way out as we’ve been going down to Orlando has never been that bad. We always use the kiosks (last time the kids had new passports and we all had new Estas) and there was no queue at all either time.

Worst thing about jfk is the queue for take off 😴 .

[Guest]

Originally Posted by Burgmeister

We flew VA to JFK earlier this month and I was pleasantly surprised with immigration. We were through in, what seemed like, no time at all.

It did, however, make a massive difference if you were a returning ESTA visitor or not. The queue for non-returning ESTA visitors was in excess of an hour, the returning ESTA visitior queue stated 5 minutes (and that was probably over stating it).

BTW, it doesn't matter whether you have a new ESTA or not, only that you have entered the US on an ESTA previously.

See more...

The time of day must make a huge difference! We queued for almost an hour just to get to a point where we could join a returning ESTA queue . I think we had been queuing for half an hour before we even got to a sign with estimated queue times. There was at least one other EU flight ahead of us and we were towards the back of our plane.

[Burgmeister]

Originally Posted by Hollie04

The time of day must make a huge difference! We queued for almost an hour just to get to a point where we could join a returning ESTA queue . I think we had been queuing for half an hour before we even got to a sign with estimated queue times. There was at least one other EU flight ahead of us and we were towards the back of our plane.

See more...

We were right at the back of our plane, my wife walks pretty slowly and we stopped to go to the toilet so we must have been last from our plane to the immigration area.

We landed at about 11:15 a.m. local time.

I was dreading it as I had heard some horror stories about JFK immigration but it really couldn't have been any easier

[MinniMouse]

Originally Posted by Hollie04

The time of day must make a huge difference! We queued for almost an hour just to get to a point where we could join a returning ESTA queue . I think we had been queuing for half an hour before we even got to a sign with estimated queue times. There was at least one other EU flight ahead of us and we were towards the back of our plane.

See more...

I don’t think it’s the time of day, rather how many flights are arriving. This was our second time at JFK in about a year. Had a week in New York last year and more recently flew edi to mco via jfk. We are returning ESTA’s and we were over an hour queuing for a machine. The hall was chaotic. We then had to queue again to go through the manned booth. There were people (families) in front of us who didn’t have the same printed piece of paper you get back from the machine with your photo etc on. Of two families in front of us who didn’t have this piece of paper really held up the line and in both cases the men were taken off to an office. DH were eventually called forward and through within a couple of minutes.

[Guest]

Originally Posted by MinniMouse

I don’t think it’s the time of day, rather how many flights are arriving. This was our second time at JFK in about a year. Had a week in New York last year and more recently flew edi to mco via jfk. We are returning ESTA’s and we were over an hour queuing for a machine. The hall was chaotic. We then had to queue again to go through the manned booth. There were people (families) in front of us who didn’t have the same printed piece of paper you get back from the machine with your photo etc on. Of two families in front of us who didn’t have this piece of paper really held up the line and in both cases the men were taken off to an office. DH were eventually called forward and through within a couple of minutes.

See more...

It’s the same thing because there are certain times when several flights are scheduled to land in quick succession. There’s actually a website somewhere that tells you how long immigration has taken hour by hour on a daily basis. I looked at it when Delta took 20 mins off our connection, and the EDI flight was landing at one of the busiest times of day.

We had to go to a booth because DH got an X. They were sending US passports one way and non US basically back to the beginning of the original queue. Luckily an agent took pity on me when he saw my crying baby and the look of stress on my face, and he sent us down the US passports only queue. I genuinely don’t think we would have made our connection otherwise!

[Burgmeister]

Hollie, that's interesting. We went to the machines - no queue. We all got an "X" and were sent to a couple of immigration cubicles that appeared to be dedicated to us "X" folk. Here there was a queue - well, there was one person waiting to be seen. We were all seen within minutes by a very friendly immigration officer who we joked with whilst he processed our passports.

[macadoo]

Originally Posted by Burgmeister

Hollie, that's interesting. We went to the machines - no queue. We all got an "X" and were sent to a couple of immigration cubicles that appeared to be dedicated to us "X" folk. Here there was a queue - well, there was one person waiting to be seen. We were all seen within minutes by a very friendly immigration officer who we joked with whilst he processed our passports.

See more...

This was our experience too, one of us always seems to get an X but we’ve never had to wait to be seen.