flying as Unaccompanied Minor

<p>FYI. Link to a similar thread:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1359813-travel-bs-out-state.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1359813-travel-bs-out-state.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Contact the school and find other kids going in your child’s direction, even if not the same school. We met the most awesome family in the airport on our first trip to begin the school year.</p>

<p>Even though our kids never became best friends, they surely watch out for each other and let the parents know who they are sitting with on the other side of tsa. </p>

<p>I find this to be true for not just kids from her school but the bs kids sort of “lump” themselves together…it’s strange…they somehow pick each other out in a crowd.</p>

<p>P.s…my d still wears her school sweatshirt when she travels.</p>

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<p>Not a bad idea! I will suggest to S to wear school sweatshirt next time he travels for school. If nothing else, it will make it easier for shuttle bus driver to identify him at airport, on the way back to school.</p>

<p>AA doesn’t require the unaccompanied minor service beyond 12, I think. I’ve done that in the past with mine but last summer she flew with a connection in Dallas on her own, and she was 13. So it definitely varies.</p>

<p>Southwest also lets 14 year olds fly independently. Our son has flown back and forth many times with no problem. The school drops bunches of kids off together and they usually hang out till their flights. He almost always ends up on a flight with a classmate on one part of his travels. I do try to avoid connections in weather dependent cities if possible in the winter.</p>

<p>The one thing I have found - even in those that do - is that they won’t allow to fly if connection is LAST one of evening</p>

<p>We’ve found that while airlines SAY they won’t let our son fly the last connection of the evening, they actually do. I don’t know that they have much choice–often there is just one evening connector.</p>

<p>A lot of it comes down to doing one’s research and doing plenty of planning. We are an international family and our 2 children have been travelling to BS since they were 15. Fortunately they were already well-seasoned travelers even before they started out on their BS experience. </p>

<p>Thus far we have experienced two ‘instances’ (4 if you include luggage going astray): one weather-induced missed connection at O’Hare when UA refused to put the kids up for the night as they said they were under-age and then mucked about with booking and unbooking onward connections, and another at Dulles due to a technical fault on the onward connecting flight.</p>

<p>My rules of thumb are:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>If there is another child flying back to your home city (or back to school), then try to coordinate with the other family and have the kids fly together. </p></li>
<li><p>Be mindful of the seasons. In particular, don’t connect through O’Hare, Detroit etc in the winter.</p></li>
<li><p>Connect using airports which are familiar to the children and are well-signposted in English, have a high level of secuirty and are not dated rabbit-warren-like structures in which the kids might get lost. As we have to do one transfer to get to the US, our preferred connecting points are Hong Kong or Seoul, both new and very efficient airports. Alternatives are Tokyo/Narita, or flying through the Middle East or Europe - both of these latter ones have their potential pitfalls and thus we do not fly that way.</p></li>
<li><p>When flying internationally, book on one of the major airlines (those with top ratings on Passenger Service Quality) who are more likely to take care of your child in the event of some unforeseen event. These days we pretty much stick to Cathay Pacific or Korean depending on schedules - both have convenient connecting times at their Hong Kong and Seoul hubs respectively. Flying within the US, I stick to one of the larger low-cost carriers, JB, VA or SW. </p></li>
</ol>

<p>5: go the most direct route possible i.e. reduce connecting points to as few a possible. </p>

<p>These days things are made easier thanks to flight tracking tools and smartphones. The kids can call you immediately if they need advice or directions. Also, as a previous poster observed, security and ‘getting lost’ becomes less of an issue once inside the net of TSA.</p>

<p>Bump, for new boarding school parents</p>

<p>My experience has been that all goes fine if you stretch the truth on your child’s age a bit, if they’re flying on an airline that has a higher age requirement around unaccompanied minors. We use an airline that requires UM until 15, but last year when friendlydaughter was 14 we just said she was 15 when purchasing tickets. Nobody between the check-in staff, the TSA, and the flight attendants was doing the math on her age. Please note, it’s not my normal MO to lie, but flying as UM would have been a big headache, embarrassing, unnecessary (for a direct flight especially), and expensive.</p>

<p>If u click during the Southwest Airlines online ticket purchase that the minor will be traveling w an adult, the check-in agent nevers bothers to confirm that an adult is actually there. </p>

<p>On the other hand, GMTson would have gotten stranded in Tokyo had I not happened to be transitting thru the airport on the same day. Singapore Airlines agent made me sign all this paperwork at the check-in counter that he was permitted to fly as an unaccompanied minor and that I acknowledge he would be switching to a connecting flight on his own-- eyeroll, no duh… </p>

<p>Bottom line is to know the airline’s policy. They’re not all the same.</p>

<p>I have a question concerning the unaccompanied minor situation:</p>

<p>I’m fifteen years old, and I’m flying up through United Airways to some schools for revisit days. The company says that 12-17 year olds are considered “young adults,” but they don’t explicitly address what this means. If I’m flying as a young adult, does this mean I can fly as if I were an adult (i.e. I don’t need to have an adult accompany me until I board my plane), or would this requirement only apply to children 11 or younger?</p>

<p>limsanity: You’d best call United to clear up any of your questions. As GMT has noted, policies differ among airlines, and you don’t want any unpleasant or unworkable surprises on travel day. Others may comment on their experience with United, but it would be best to rely on the answers you get directly from the airline. Good luck to you and have fun on your revisits.</p>

<p>@limsanity, it means it is not mandatory for you to purchase the Unaccompanied Minor service if you are traveling w/o an adult:
<a href=“http://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/specialneeds/minors/default.aspx”>http://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/specialneeds/minors/default.aspx&lt;/a&gt;
Best to call them to make sure.</p>

<p>I strongly recommend if you choose not to buy the service, that if you have a connecting flight, you avoid the last flight of the day. The problem is if you don’t make your connecting flight, the airline can not put you up in a hotel as a minor.</p>

<p>Great advice everybody but I have to laugh about avoiding certain airport connections in winter. D can’t get anywhere without traveling through Minneapolis, Denver, Chicago, or Salt Lake. </p>

<p>She got caught in a massive flight cancellation this winter and the airline did help her get set up in a hotel even though she is only 15. I have been concerned about how that would play out since most motels make a big deal nowadays that you have to be 21 to register. </p>

<p>D carries a credit card. No one even called me (except D of course). She was traveling independently on United. You can run into problems even with United if a connecting flight happens to be a partner airline with stricter unaccompanied minor cutoffs. I think we ran into this with some US Air connecting flights so we chose a different routing. We also cannot always avoid last flight of the day so I’m actually a little relieved to find out D could get into a motel if she needed to.</p>

<p>Although the motels have the age 21 rule, I don’t think they or the airlines would want the liability of leaving a child without shelter. Maybe there is some emergency clause.</p>

<p>I have read more than once someone’s advice to lie about a student’s age. And I understand that so far those folks have not had a problem. However, for the newbies, I would like to suggest not to be tempted to lie. You risk getting held up at check-in or screening. If your child is traveling alone or even if you’re there with them at the airport to drop them off, do you want to risk a big hassle just to save $100 or whatever? </p>

<p>Yes, I know the “accompaniment” package is unnecessary and sort of embarrassing for an independent teenager (they made my D wear a wristband and be closely supervised during her layover) but I’d go that route any day vs. missing a flight because someone notices the age discrepancy and makes a big deal of it.</p>

<p>Along the same lines, even though kids under a certain age don’t have to show ID, my D always travels with our home state ID card. Another parent I know, whose son is very tall and looks older than his age, has him travel with his passport.</p>

bump, for new BS parents

Sending my DD to Europe this summer and noticed that almost all American airline carriers consider 14 years olds too young to fly alone, and require 150 added on each way for a minder. However, British Airways considers 13 and up as old enough to go it alone. Still checking it out, but it seems like a good option if you have confidence in your child to handle it.

I just got Global Entry for GMCkid, and she uses that ID (which has a photo) now instead of carrying her passport around. A perk of that program, which I wasn’t aware of until after we had applied, is that you automatically qualify for TSA pre-check.

A new “unaccompanied minor” issue cropped up this year for us.

S2 had an int’l itinerary w a different airline for the connecting flight. Because of the east coast snowstorm, he watched as the notice board announced his 1st flight’s departure delay stretching to 3 hrs. I knew he wouldn’t make his connection in europe.

Because there were 2 airlines involved, it wasn’t clear which airline would be responsible for him if he got stuck. In any case, as a minor, it was unlikely he’d be allowed to stay in a hotel by himself, especially in a foreign country.

So, I told him to go back to school. He stayed another night in the dorm, and I rebooked him for a departure the next day.

LEARNINGS:

  • If the itinerary involves different airlines or winter weather, there needs to be extra generous time cushion for connecting
  • if child has a connection, it’s important to monitor the departure time of the first flight
  • avoid booking child on a connecting flight that is the last flight of the day (hard to do for some int’l itineraries)
  • avoid booking child on connecting flight involving a different carrier (hard to do for some int’l itineraries)
  • keep the dorm master and school travel coordinator in the communications loop about travel contingencies

Glad to see this topic pop back up. Ease of getting DS to/from potential schools is one of the issues I have been thinking about, as he will not yet be 15 this fall, but fortunately, not as challenging as those of you with international components. It looks like there is a lot of variation in the airlines UM policies - and that may influence which one(s) he ends up taking to get back and forth. Thanks to all who have shared your wisdom. And to second @GMC2918’s comment - DS also has Global Entry - and it makes TSA much less of a hassle!