Round Trip Flight Bought On Thai Passport

[ohman 5]

My wife is hopefully going to have her US passport soon, but when we bought the round trip flight for the interview from outside of the US, we used her Thai passport number I believe. Her name will be the same. I just wanted to check if there could be a problem with this as we leave the US having bought the ticket with her Thai passport (and at that point she will have a US passport as well). 

Edited June 30, 2018 by ohman

[Jojo92122 1,925]

The US does not care what passport a person uses to leave the US.

[Going through 5,674]

According to 8 USC 1185(b), US citizens are required to have a US passport to enter and leave the US, except as provided by regulation (the exceptions are alternative documents that mostly apply to land/sea travel only). The US doesn’t have exit checks, so the “leave” part is largely meaningless; it’s only “enter” that matters.

 

Make sure she re-enters the US with her new US passport.

Edited June 30, 2018 by Going through

[JFH 12,192]

Many people confuse airline requirements and immigration requirements. Airlines (including my employer) are not immigration agents. All we require is that the passport name matches the ticket and that the passport is valid. Since USCs and Thai nationals can enter Thailand without a visa, it doesn’t matter which passport she shows to the airline, provided that it is valid and the name matches. The name-matching issue has more to do with stopping ticket fraud than immigration. If the passport number was entered at the time of booking, this can be changed without issue. 

 

Showing the passport to the airline is not the same as showing the passport to immigration. You can travel on one passport and show another to immigration and I have done this before although not in the US. Immigration cannot see your reservation unless you consent them to look at it (and they would have little reason to want to see it - they don’t care how much you paid for the ticket). Customs may want to see it when they suspect people are smuggling drugs or other illegal goods and they want to know where you’ve been and for how long and how the ticket was purchased. But that’s a completely separate matter. Boarding the plane is not entering the country. Passing through the CBP inspection point is entering the country. At this point she must show the US passport. It makes sense that a dual Thai-US citizen would show the US passport to board a flight to the US as the agent will be looking for a valid visa in the Thai passport. 

Edited June 30, 2018 by JFH

[gnakr 43]

I have a friend who traveled out the U.S. just a few days after getting his American passport after naturalization. The visa was in his original country's passport and he was able to travel with it, and he reentered with his U.S. passport.

[ohman 5]

Thanks everyone. I was pretty sure this would not be a problem, but my wife was concerned about it so i thought i would ask for peace of mind. Thanks!!