For all those nonimmigrants who plan to visit their home country and return back to the United States, make sure to print an I-94 if you come into the U.S. from abroad with a nonimmigrant visa.
A few months back, U.S. Customs and Border Protection stopped issuing I-94 documents to arriving nonimmigrants. This, in turn, has resulted in unanticipated problems that are not always obvious to foreign nationals coming to the United States.
CBP officers now place a stamp in the arriving nonimmigrants passport. This stamp shows the following
- Date and place of arrival
- The nonimmigrant visa category given
- The date of expiration of nonimmigrant status
or at least it is supposed to contain all of this information.Unfortunately, it is not at all uncommon to see stamps that are missing one or more of those required elements. Worse, we commonly see a difference between what the CBP officer’s hand writes in the passport and what is entered into the CBP database.
How to get a paper copy of I-94?
The only way to assure yourself that information has been entered accurately is to go to www.cbp.gov/i94and enter your personal information to see what the database actually shows. You may and should print a paper I-94 from that site to keep for your records.
Many arriving nonimmigrants discover that their data is not, in fact, available on that web site. This could be due to a mistake on the non immigrant’s passport, a mistake on the airline boarding manifest, or a mistake by the CBP officer. No matter the reason, if there is an incorrect or missing entry, you need to get it fixed.
Fortunately, almost everyone these days has a Smartphone. Before you leave the airport, go towww.cbp.gov/i94 and verify the accuracy of your information. If it is inaccurate or missing, turn right around and go back to CBP and insist that they correct the problem immediately.
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