Your Guide to the ESTA for Us Travel

If you plan on travelling to the US, or even if it’s just a point of passing in your trip, you’ll need an Electronic System for Travel Authorisation (ESTA for short) in advance. In this piece, we help you understand what ESTA is, how you can get one and how much you need to pay.

What is ESTA?

ESTA is a system that is able to tell you in advance if you’re eligible to come to the US, under the VWP program (that’s short for Visa Waiver Program).

In the past, you had to fill a form in the plane while you were already on your way to the US. They’d tell you the answer when you got there – and if you didn’t fit under the VWP, then you couldn’t enter the country. But that’s all changed now. Now you can complete an ESTA and the program will tell you in advance if you can enter the country or not. This way, you won’t need to worry that you booked your hotel and you couldn’t get to it when you’re at the airport. Again, this is required for everyone, even if you just cross the land border through Canada or Mexico.

However, ESTA won’t guarantee your entry.

You need to keep in mind that even if you get the ESTA, you’re not going to enter the country automatically. You’re just ‘eligible to travel’. There is a US Customs and Border Protection officer at the entry who will decide if you’re allowed to enter or not. It’s their decision, really. If you don’t have a criminal record that you forgot to mention, then you shouldn’t worry.

You can only fill it online

The ESTA application can be filled only on the internet, so make sure you work that out. After you did it, you need to keep your reference number somewhere where it’s safe. If you can, print the authorization page, too.

The price is $14

All the application fees cost $14 each, and $4 if you get rejected. That’s about $56 for a family of four. Make sure you pay for the right thing to avoid being charged with a foreign exchange load fee.

Be aware of scams

When you Google ESTA, you might find lots of sites which pretend to be the official one and which will take your money for your application. Always go for the official site for the ESTA registration.

You will need to renew it after two years

And this also happens if you’ve lost your passport, or your existing authorisation got expired. There’s only one way to renew it, and that is to fill a new application and get a new reference number.