PERSONAL PROPERTY WHILE HELD BY CBP
CBP may temporarily control or store a traveler’s passport, luggage, money, mobile devices and other belongings while the traveler is in secure custody. CBP policy divides personal property into categories and requires procedures for storage, return, transfer or repatriation.
CBP’s personal-property directive defines personal property to include belongings found on or carried by a detainee, including baggage, monetary instruments, identification, clothing, jewelry, mobile devices and medication.
Property being temporarily stored during CBP custody is not necessarily the same thing as property being seized or forfeited.
CBP custody standards permit certain personal items to remain with a detainee when the item does not create a health, safety, security or facility-management concern.
Items that cannot remain with the traveler may be categorized and stored by CBP during short-term detention. The property rules distinguish ordinary personal property from contraband or evidence that may be subject to separate detention, seizure or law-enforcement procedures.
CBP detention standards state that genuine, unaltered identity documents issued under proper authority must be returned upon release, removal or repatriation, or maintained with the person’s personal property.
TEDS requires detainees who are not being immediately repatriated to certain contiguous countries to receive information about procedures for claiming personal property after release, transfer or removal, having a third party claim property, and claiming lost property.
CBP ordinarily requires arriving international passengers entering the United States to retrieve checked baggage for customs processing. Airline handling determines how checked baggage is rerouted when a passenger is not continuing on the planned itinerary.
A traveler whose bags do not accompany the return trip should obtain the baggage claim information and contact the carrier as well as determine whether CBP separately detained any property.
CBP’s property directive distinguishes personal property from contraband. Items considered prohibited, evidence or subject to seizure may be held under separate customs or law-enforcement authority.
CBP can control identification documents while a person is being processed or held. Its custody standards provide for genuine identification documents to be returned upon release, removal or repatriation or maintained with the traveler’s property.
No. Ordinary custody storage and formal detention or seizure of property are different actions.
Determine first whether CBP detained any item. If not, use the airline baggage-claim process for checked baggage that was misrouted or did not accompany the return trip.
These government materials provide the principal return-transportation and CBP personal-property rules discussed on this page.
The documents CBP issued and the airline baggage record can show whether an item was stored, detained, seized or simply misrouted.