In the Hot Seat
John McAuliff of the Fund for Reconciliation and Development offers his views on the complicated, confusing and ever-changing Cuba travel regulations. Read More
Anyone who feels confused about what’s going on with the people-to-people travel programs to Cuba has lots of company.
Think government bureaucracy run amok, combined with consumer (and media) confusion. Then add operator stress due to trip cancellations and/or postponements, staff cutbacks and loss of revenue, and you begin to get a sense of where this program is heading.
Dozens of license-renewal applications, which are required each year by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC), are backlogged in OFAC’s Washington office.
Meanwhile, companies previously licensed to operate the programs are in a holding pattern, unable to move forward with their fall and winter programs.
When the program was discontinued in 2003, the licenses had a two-year validity period. The Obama administration reinstated the program in January 2011, but licenses are now valid for just one year.
Companies began receiving their licenses to operate the programs in June 2011 and beyond, which means that the majority of the licenses have already expired or soon will.
Of the dozens of licenses submitted for renewal, only a handful have received the go-ahead.
OFAC is not transparent about which companies received the licenses in the first place, although the figure has been placed at 140, said John McAuliff, executive director of the Fund for Reconciliation and Development (FRD), a nonprofit aimed at normalizing relations between the U.S. and Cuba.
“Travel is the key to breaking through the suspicion and hostility of 52 years,” McAuliff said.
FRD has applied for a license to operate people-to-people programs but has been turned down five times, McAuliff said. The latest application is pending.
OFAC’s new guidelines for the people-to-people programs demand additional information from the licensees.
The original application for a license was a six-page document. Operators had to provide a sample itinerary, describe the group activities and explain how the trip activities would promote interactions of a cultural or educational nature.
OFAC revised the process in May, with applications now averaging about 100 pages.
This was done “to deter abuses because of reports we received,” said Jeff Braunger, OFAC’s program manager for Cuba travel licensing.
Companies operating people-to-people programs, including Insight Cuba, Friendly Planet, National Geographic Expeditions, Collette Vacations and Austin-Lehman, applied for and received a specific one-year license at different times in 2011 to operate the programs. They did not need to partner with a nonprofit organization to get the license or to operate the programs.
But those companies and all companies holding a specific people-to-people license had to then turn to U.S.-licensed Travel Service Providers to handle all travel arrangements for the programs, including booking hotels, air, tours and activities in Cuba. Charter air arrangements are handled by Carrier Service Providers.
A new twist in OFAC’s latest regulations is that the service providers no longer are authorized to issue the tourist cards needed for entry into Cuba.
In the past, they would get blank entry cards, fill them out with the information on the passenger who was going on a U.S.-licensed people-to-people program and attach them to the air charter ticket.
Now, the travelers themselves must obtain the tourist cards from the Cuban Interest Section housed in the Swiss Embassy in Washington.
The change was made by the U.S. government, “although OFAC never warned anyone about the change, nor, to my knowledge, did they consult with the Cubans,” one operator said.
Follow Gay Nagle Myers on Twitter @gnmtraveleekly.
Correction: John McAuliff's name was misspelled in a prior version of this report.