The selectee
The situation
On a regular basis I fly from New York to Dublin. Usually I buy a one-way ticket with Aer Lingus – Aer Lingus offers reasonable fares for one-way tickets – but sometimes I choose Continental, because I like the late flight out of New York.
Whenever I buy a one-way ticket to Dublin with Continental I’m selected as a selectee, excuse me for the pleonasm.
You know that you are a selectee when you find the following text on your boarding card: “SSSS.”
Every passenger with the intention to board a plane is a suspect but some passengers are more suspect than others. These passengers are called “selectees.”
The only reason I can think of that I’m turned into a selectee whenever I try to board a plan with a one-way ticket Newark-Dublin on Continental is the one-way ticket.
When you are a selectee there is a solution: Wait and let the situation develop.
Sometimes the inspectors get physical, other times they just look in your boots.
And there is the comfort that people in the intelligence community have discovered that terrorists buy one-way tickets. And fly Continental instead of Aer Lingus, at least sometimes.
It turns out you become a ‘selectee’ everywhere; yesterday in my service company, now in the air space. Enjoy the special attention.
Have in nice stay in Dublin.
Jan T
When I’ll write my memoirs they will be called “A selectee looks back.”Have you contacted Sander about your problems relating to this site? Of course feel free to contact him about other problems as well. The last time I saw him he was a wizard.
And there are people who build their identity upon the fact
they are called a 'sssselectee'.
I feel a tragic play about a plane, a man and five of his former lives coming up.
In fact he contacted me; I think he is even clairvoyant. Keep him close, he is your Merlin. We wait and see. Thanks.
Selectees
A one-way ticket, particularly an international ticket, is a 100% guarantee that you'll be selected. It's one of the behaviors that raise red flags for security personnel and is programmed into the computers that print that 'SSSS' on your boarding pass. If you pay in cash for a ticket, you'll get that special treatment, too.It's a matter of 'behavior profiling'.
Even with a USG-provided ticket and a US Diplomatic passport, I got SSSS-ed on every one-way flight since 9/11.
John
I have to contradict your statement, at least partly. When I fly out of New York to Dublin on a one-way-ticket with Aer Lingus it doesn’t happen: there is no SSSS on your boarding card.And by the way I thought that Transportation Security Administration had gotten rid of the rule that passengers with one-way-tickets are high-risk. Apparently not.
