www.CostaRicaTicas.com

This may be a stupid question but I seems like there has been some problems recently in SJO. I have a trip planned for sept. to come down and have a little fun. All prev trips were more sight seeing trips of CR this trip planned is purely a little R&R in SJO. My question is when flying in and coming through customs am I going to run into a hassle If my hotel destination on my customs form says I'm going to be staying somewhere like the Del Rey or the SL?

No.

While I’d be inclined to agree he wouldn’t – the reality is how do you know? You’re not the one stamping his passport. It’s a completely legitimate question of the customs agent to inquire the purpose of ones visit.

Generally if all the documentation is in order there should be no problem with a seamless right of passage. ALWAYS prepare yourself to elaborate what “tourism” one wishes to partake, IE: Architectural/ Historical, Topographical, etc…

I don't think they really look at it that carefully or, if they do notice, they care one way or the other. However, if you're really at all concerned about it, why not just put down the name of another hotel. Its not like they stop and call to see if you really have a reservation at whereever you list, or call you later in the week to see if you're really staying there. And, even if they did, all you wrote was your planned address while in CR. For all they know, you might have gone to that hotel, found it fully booked or took one look at it and wound up staying elsewhere. Plus it not like most visitors typically stay at one place when they visit CR either. They usually visit different areas and thus stay at different hotels. They don't ask you to list every place you plan to stay while in CR. Frankly, I don't know why they even bother to include that line on those forms.

Why? Its CR customs/immigration. Your more then welcome to stay at whatever hotel you want, and partake in whatever legal activity you see fit. Prostitution is not illegal.

By making something up, or putting a fake occupancy down all your doing is setting yourself up for trouble. What happens in the case they have a mess-up and need to get ahold of you, and all of a sudden you were never at the Best Western Irazu doing an eco-tour? Then you lied on a legal document, and your in 1000x more shit then if you were to just say you went to the Del Rey.

Wasn't their some stat posted on AMcostarica that the majority of tico's have paid for sex? I highly doubt they are going to be appalled.

Personally I never say the name of the hotel on my form...I just write....BARRIO OTOYA, SAN JOSE, CR, never been questioned about it in 21 entrances.

I agree with El S, except I'm even more vague, I just put San Jose and have never been questioned.

Agreed. Just put San Jose and in the unlikely event that they request further info just say you dont have a hotel booked yet.

_________________
I believe in moderation in everything except excess.
I phuck 'em just to see the look on their face.
Klatu, berata, nicto.

Do they even look at the forms? Seems like they merely investigate the date stamps (must be 72 hours between trips). Be polite, respectful, and smile. You can leave it blank and just say, "I would like to enjoy all that this beautiful country has to offer. What do you recommend?"

Be sure to say please and thank you. Speak Engles only or realy bad Espanol. The best duty free is near baggage claim so wait for it after immigration. Make friends with some earth friendlies from the plane in line. Act like you are together. If you are gooned then pretend you are just all bubbly about your once a year vacay.

Remember, they are not looking at you. They are looking at the $2,000 USD stapled to your forehead. Pura Vida!

Add my voice. In the last year, i have had 8 entrances, and each and every time I merely wrote "san jose", and never once been questioned.

JMac, I think you're being just as paranoid as the newbie. My point was that it really doesn't matter what the hell you write down in that space as long as you scribble something so that the immigration can put a check next to it indicating you filled it out. There is absolutely zero chance that they'll prosecute you for "lying on a legal document" for several reasons.

First, I can't imagine any conceivable reason why they'd ever need or bother to follow up with you relying on what you wrote on some semi-legibly filled out, vague and incomplete form. If there is some personal emergency back home, presumably someone there would have a better way of getting in contact with you than having CR immigration search through their piles of paper scraps and deciphering what you filled out. And if it was not a personal emergency but something more generic, then they're not going to be contacting you that way either. They'd be contacting all the hotels to notify foreign visitors or using the media or something else more efficient. Do you think someone really takes those scraps of paper and either digitizes it, enters the reported hotel info into some database, or sorts by name or passport number and then files it away so it can be researched and dug up. More likely they just take the whole pile at the end of each day and either throw it all into a box or the trashcan. So the idea that they'd ever follow-up and somehow catch you in your inaccuracy could be one of the more absurd things I've read on this board.

But even if for some really weird and extremely rare and unlikely reason they did try to contact you at some place you never stayed, it is even more unlikely to the extreme that would put you in any legal jeopardy. A) I sincerely doubt that such inconsequential "document fraud" is any more worth their bothering to prosecute than it would be worth their time investigate to begin with. And B) you have a simple explanation. All you put down was your "FORESEEN address", that is ALL. Your simple "legal defense" (not that you'd even need it) is that sometimes plans change. You never said you had a reservation anywhere, only was that was where you intended to stay. As far as they're concerned, if it even comes to that, you simply changed your mind about where you wanted to go on your way into town. That could happen, especially if you didn't have any reservation to begin with. And how are they really going to know you had a reservation anywhere else? I know, you're going to tell me they also monitor all e-mail and phone correspondence going into CR. But then if they were doing that and knew where you had reservations then why would they need you to fill that out on the form?

The level of paranoia some people some times display really amazes me.

Well I said no.

I don't personally see the point in lying on it when your doing nothing wrong. Its totally unnecessary.

This thread is entitled people in the know. All others should abstain.

Thanks for all the input, it all makes perfect sense. I am not a newbie my profile just says that, though prev visits were more for rafting, hiking etc..
I would definatly agree that customs has never really looked at my form but from the sound of some of the recent posts some sort of shit hit the fan in SJO. So I guess I was wondering if I needed to expect anything unusual..Thanks for all you replies.

Unless you specifically wanted a CR customs agent to chime in, that is about as good as your going to get; a bunch of people who frequently travel.