clearing customs--Frankfort or Rome?
 

Going to Rome in two weeks via Frankfort airport. Where will I clear customs? Frankfort or Rome?

We flew Toronto to Rome via Frankfurt on Lufthansa in early January and cleared in Frankfurt - had a long (6 hour) layover - don't know if that makes a difference....luggage went straight through so in fact our luggage never had the opportunity to be checked which we found odd.

>...luggage went straight through so in fact our luggage never had the opportunity to be checked ...<

It's not Customs that are interested in you, it's Immigration that wants to see your passport.

((I))

Elizabeth_S, I think I understand what you are saying because I had the same confusion the last time I flew to Venice. SFO to Amesterdam. Change of plane. My check in bag went straight through to Venice.

I picked up my bag in Venice. No one in the airport was checking anyones luggage (in otherwords there was no one there for Customs). I took my bag and walked out of the airport.

Now that day the Italian aircontrollers had been on strike for something like 8 hours so confusion reigned at the Venice airport. But I did not even say anywhere where Custom's would normally be. The time before in Venice I think they looked at my passport but that was all.

A friend there said it was because I had flown in from Amsterdam versus a flight that had flown non stop from the US directly to Italy. It was because the EU no longer has any kind of border control between EU countries.

I wonder, did my check in luggage get xrayed in Amsterdam? I have always been curious about this.

Ira and LoveItaly - I'm using Customs and Immigration interchangeably - which is incorrect.

As mentioned, I was surprised that no countries Customs were interested in our bags.

Just came back from 2 weeks in Italy. We went through immigration where they check your passport in Frankfurt, very short line. Our bags all went straight through to Rome. We had absolutely no immigration nor customs in Rome. Just picked up our bags and left the airport.

On our way back had several ticket and passport checks in Frankfurt and had to go through two different security checks, so leave plenty of time for all this. When we arrived in Portland (first US stop) had to claim our baggage and go through customs then put luggage on the re-check belt for our connecting flight.