Travelers have until February 1 to get a passport or a RealID—or cough up $45 more to board an airplane anywhere in the United States, the TSA announced this morning.
On that date, TSA will begin turning away every flyer over 18 who shows up at the airport without an acceptable ID or a receipt showing they have paid the $45 fee online in advance. If not, they will be directed to a separate security line, where processing will take 10-30 minutes
While the original plan, announced just last week, was to charge $18, TSA officials at a press conference this morning said they “reassessed the cost associated with providing this option to travelers and, after careful review, determined the costs were higher than originally projected. And we want to ensure the cost is borne by the 6% of the traveling public that does not have a ReaklID, and not the 94% that is compliant today.”
Acceptable IDs also will include Google and Apple RealID and passport cards.
The fee will cover travel for 10 days from the first flight, so travelers leaving home for longer will have to pay again upon their return.
“We really want to drive people to compliance,” TSA said. At the same time, they chose Feb. 1 as a start date to give folks plenty of time to prepare before it goes into effect, and not slow down holiday travel.
IN the meantime, TSA “is working behind the scenes to make sure everything is set up, and will continue to communicate to get the information out.” TSA.gov will have instructions for customers, and direct travelers to Pay.gov to complete the verification process and receive an email to bring to the airport as proof of payment.
“There will be a landing page by the end of today, and then we will continue to work on the functionality. It should be fully functional by mid-December if not earlier,” TSA said.
Payments are nonrefundable.
“We want to make sure we know who you are and that we keep bad actors off our airplanes and keep the system safe,” they said.