After four and a half years of travel, I finally filled the last page in my well-worn passport, well before its January 2019 expiry date. Go me.
My new passport has arrived, and it’s lovely and all, but it also represents a big pain in the tuchus because I need to now reapply for my:
- APEC Business Travel Card
- US ESTA
- Australian ETA
- Canadian eTA
The new passport has some impressive features though:
Anyway, I’m flying to Australia later this month to review Singapore Airlines’ new A380 Suites and business class products, so I need to get my ETA done again. As per the official website, it costs A$20 (S$20.50). Please, please don’t fall for those sites which masquerade like the official site but charge you much more. Most of them aren’t “scams” in the sense that they’ll still get the proper ETA for you, but they’re just cynical attempts to earn a margin where there shouldn’t be any.
I wasn’t thrilled about having to pay A$20 again, but someone in The Milelion’s Telegram Group (if it seems like I’m mentioning this a lot, it’s because I am. That group is a wellspring of knowledge) mentioned that ETAs are free for applications done from travel agencies. The agency may charge a small fee for their time, but it’ll often be less than the A$20 it’ll cost you to DIY.
The problem is- there are a lot of scam sites out there and you need to be careful. Many people swore by a user who goes by the handle “Kangaroos_Kang” on HWZ, so I decided to give it a try. You can find the full details here, if you’re interested.
To summarize- Kangaroos_Kang charges S$7 for the ETA. You send them your details, you get the email confirmation with your ETA and then you pay them. I’m quite surprised they’re willing to do the application before they get any payment (but then again, since the ETA is indeed free for agencies to apply then at most they lose 10 minutes of their time), but anyway it means there’s little risk to you.
You can get two free ETAs if you post regularly on certain forums. Here’s the details
1) Have been a Forum member for more than 12months
2) More than 230 posts
3) Minimum 20 posts for the past 30 days
4) Air-ticket bought directly from the Airlines website. Not thru any 3rd party website.
(Eg. AsiaTravel, Zuji and Expedia or thru any Travel Agency etc)
5) Active Members from the below forums
www.hardwarezone.com.sg (HWZ)
www.mycarforum.com (MCF)
www.lowyat.net (LYN)
www.flyertalk.com (FYT)
www.kiasuparents.com (KSP)
I don’t post all that much so I just decided to do the S$7 package. I was really impressed, because 17 minutes after I emailed them my details I got an email with my confirmed ETA.
Please note that there’s a special way of going about to check the ETA you just received. You will not have a transaction reference number (TRN), as that’s only for those who apply qua-individual on the official website. If you apply through a travel agent, follow these steps to check your validity.
I imagine that if you’re traveling as a family, your savings could be substantial. And it’s really not a whole lot more effort than going through the official site. So yes- tip for the day, don’t pay full price for your ETA.
Now, if only applying for a new APEC card was this fast…
Aaron, I think you do not need to reapply the US ESTA if it is still valid. Just need to update your new passport number at the Trusted Traveller Program website. That was what I did. Note that GOES website is not longer valid and a new account at TTP will need to be setup. Have your PASSID available for easy linkage.
Not exactly. Esta site says you need to apply for a new esta if you change your passport details. I updated my new passport on the new ttp site, but my understanding is that esta and ttp are totally different. If you check in, airlines will ask to see your esta based on what passport you hold, they don’t care if you have global entry or not
How many stamps in your old passport?
don’t make me count boss. Hundred over
86 in one passport and 92 in another – last 5 years, considering that 3 countries I where I travel/return (Singapore) most do not put stamps in respective passports. Otherwise it would be double of that amount.
You do not need an Australia ETA if you already have a valid APEC BTC. Of course this would mean you must wait till Australia is one of the approving countries for your temporary/interim APEC BTC.
My abtc is through Australia so process might be different. But my understanding is with the approval now for 5yrs – countries can now reissue you a new card for the remainder of the 5yr period without another round of approvals if you get a new passport. I believe this was a change from the previous rules which had 3yr validities
Apparently it would be treated as a new application – Question 5 FAQ.
https://eabtc.ica.gov.sg/eabtc/xhtml/info/Faq.xhtml
Aaron,
For someone who uses Blackberry,. That is a lot. crazy lot of personal information going into someone’s private email account. Sitting there, maybe archived. There is no guarantee or agreement, neither do you have proof if decides to sell your information some day, or his Yahoo email gets compromised.
Would you have paid more to get it from a proper credible source?
yeah, i mean i get what you’re saying, but to me it’s conceptually similar to using a travel agent. the travel agent will have all that info, i’m sure some of them have less than robust security measures too. that’s actually an interesting thread that talks about this: https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/13464/what-harm-can-be-done-with-a-copy-of-ones-passport ultimately there has to be some degree of trust in all these things- that’s why we read reviews and do diligence and go with someone who has a positive track record. and if the equifax breach is anything to go by, it doesn’t necessarily mean a bigger firm keeps your data… Read more »
Don’t bother with the hassle of posting counts and revealing your avatars to Kangaroo_Kang on HWZ. Just google “Australia ETA” and you’d find a travel agent that does it for $7. Life CAN be simple!