Email saying ESTA cancelled

corm500

Wonder can anyone shed some light on this. I recieved an email earlier in the year from the Department of Homeland Security telling me that my ESTA which does not run out until August 2017 had been cancelled.
The email said that I did not have a biometric passport and due to new rules they were cancelling it.
I didnt take much notice as I had no plans to return to the US in the next year. However now I am going next March to Orlando.
I took out the passport and it does seem to be biometric. It is machine readable and has the biometric logo on the bottom of the cover (rectangular with a circle in the middle). Also the passport was issued in 2009 and the Irish passport website says it only affects passports from before 2006.

I have looked up my ESTA status on the ESTA website and all is good there, it says im still approved till next August. Confused here. Last thing I want to do is turn up at border control next March and be turned away. Any advice?

garbeth

Are you sure the email came from the department of homeland security. If the website you are on is legit take a print out of it and your good to go.

I would think that the email you got was a phishing exercise. I.e. Click the link and we'll get your esca for an exorbitant fee.

Atlantic Dawn

What email address did it show as being from? Was the email addressed to you or lots of email addresses? Does the content of the email mention your exact name in the text?

corm500

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

What email address did it show as being from? Was the email addressed to you or lots of email addresses? Does the content of the email mention your exact name in the text?

I got the email around the start of April and have deleted it along the way. I do believe it was real, there was no links for me to click or anything like that. I will ring the US embassy in the morning to see if they can shed any light on it.

garbeth

I would think that if it was legit then the website would also say that it was cancelled. Ring the embassy as they are the only ones who can say for sure.

Steve

There are a lot of scam emails to do with ESTA.

https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/esta/ is the official site as told to thejournal.ie here:

http://www.thejournal.ie/esta-sites-overcharging-irish-customers-2266852-Aug2015/

If your status is good there I'd believe it.

corm500

Rang the Embassy this morning. Turns out there was a blip in the system and they sent out the email to a load of people by mistake, saying the esta was cancelled even though it was still approved, so happy days.

goingnowhere

Some of the early issued biometric passports are no good, 2009 issue should be fine.

ESTA's could be cancelled for a whole lot of reasons including travel to certain 'unfriendly' countries.

As advised above, go to the ESTA https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/esta/ and enter your details and it will confirm your status

Poochie05

corm500 wrote: »

Rang the Embassy this morning. Turns out there was a blip in the system and they sent out the email to a load of people by mistake, saying the esta was cancelled even though it was still approved, so happy days.

You'd think they'd have sent a follow up email to explain that!

corm500

Poochie05 wrote: »

You'd think they'd have sent a follow up email to explain that!

You'd think so yeah.