Airport Avenger: Tips and Top Secrets for Airlines, Airfares, Fees, Security and Cancelations

• Be patient. The length of time it takes to get through security varies with the airport, time of day, time of year and how many TSA agents are on duty.

• Some airports list security wait times on their web sites. Don’t rely too heavily on them. Conditions can change by the time you get there.

• You don’t have to show up at 6:00 AM for a noon flight. But give yourself enough time in case you hit a long line or you get delayed by a bag inspection. Arriving a couple of hours before flight time is sufficient at most U.S. airports. Add at least an hour for flights heading to the U.S. from another country.

• A couple of private companies are working with the TSA to offer pre-screened security checks at some airports. One of them is "Clear," which will restart operations in the fall after a stint in bankruptcy protection.

• When you join Clear, you get fingerprinted, have your eyes scanned and provide personal identification items like your social secrutity number. All of that is kept on file for positive identification when you go through a separate and presumably quicker security check at the airport.

• The service costs $179 a year, $50 more for a family plan. It will be available at about 20 airports aroudn the country with plans to expand.

• If you're a frequent traveler to or from one of those airports, you may find it worthwhile. About 160,000 people did the first time Clear was in operation. If you were one of them, the new Clear will honor your membership.

• More information: www.flyclear.com

• Most airlines have "priority security lines" at some airports for their first-class, business-class and top-level frequent fliers. You may get this perk if you pay full economy fare too. But it's back of the line, if you've got a discount ticket.

• The priority lines basically let you skip to the front of the securityline by using a reserved, less-traveled line. You still have to go through all the security screening that everyone else does.

• You might save some time on the priority lien, if the regular security lines are long and moving slowly. If they're short, well, there's really not much difference between them.

• In most cases, there's no extra fee for the priority line. But then you've already paid top dollar for your ticket or you fly often enough so, the airlines say, "cuts" on line are on us.

Make it easier—and quicker—by not causing a scene. You may feel you have been unfairly singled out, but chances are you were randomly chosen or you may have some metal on you somewhere (body piercings, prosthetics) that needs closer inspection.

If you have to get a pat-down, you can have it done out of sight of the security checkpoint crowd and by someone of your own sex.

There’s also a chance your name is on a watch list or a "No-Fly" list. Not because you’re a terrorist, but because it happens to be the same name as someone they’re, well, watching. There have been a number of mistaken identity cases like this.

The government doesn't say who's on its lists. Someone who is on a list generally doesn't find out until his or her boarding pass fails to print out at a kiosk or a gate agent keeps that person from boarding the plane and TSA or law enforcement people show up.

Use Your Head.

Now for the common-sense part of getting through security as painlessly as possible. This is not the time or place to try out your stand-up comedy routine about terrorists and bumbling security agents. Even if you think you’re out of earshot of the TSA, nervous passengers might not know you’re joking. They’ve been known to point out people they think are talking about bombs or bringing down planes. Your little joke can get you pulled aside, maybe arrested. Save it for the comedy club.

Keep your ID and boarding pass handy until you’re clear of the security area. Make sure it’s a government-issued picture ID with the same name on it that’s on your ticket. It can be a driver’s license, state-issued non-driver ID, passport, military ID or Native American Tribal ID. Fishing and hunting licenses, library cards and credit cards will not do.

Until recently all people traveling to the U.S. from these countries have been checked more closely:

• Afghanistan
• Algeria
• Lebanon
• Libya
• Iraq
• Nigeria
• Pakistan
• Saudi Arabia
• Somalia
• Yemen
• Cuba
• Iran
• Sudan
• Syria

Under the latest rules, travelers from these countries will be questioned more closely or detained only if they've been tagged as security risks because of suspicious activities.

There's the Watch List, the No-Fly List and one that doesn't get a lot of publicity: The Interpol List. Interpol is the world's largest international police organization and is part of the airport security screening system along with the TSA, the FBI and customs officials. Interpol has a huge database of around 20 million lost and stolen passports and other identity documents, the kind of thing criminals, terrorists and spies are fond of.

Seems like a handy thing to check in case someone's trying to sneak into the country on somebody else's good name. But according to Ronald Noble, the secretary-general of Interpol, up until about two years ago U.S. security people checked it only about 2,000 times a year. That turned up 80 or so phony passports. In 2009 the U.S. ran 78 milion searches and caught almost 4,000 people traveling with lost or stolen documents.

Still, Noble says there were over 500 million international arrivals worldwide in 2009 that were not checked against Interpol records.

If you discover you are mistakenly on a watch list, let the folks at Homeland Security know by filing a complaint with the Traveler Redress Inquiry Program.

The government recently told airlines they must check for updates to the No-Fly list more frequently than they used to: Within two hours of being notified by that the list has changed. Previously they had to check it within 24 hours.

It was that gap that almost allowed the prime suspect in the failed Times Square car bombing in May to get away.

He was able to buy a last-minute ticket with cash (also a red flag) and get on a plane headed for the Middle East before security agents hauled him off.

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