Eapis made easy - Flashpass.net

[Ericthepilot]

I live in South Florida for the last 26 years. And I have flown to the Bahamas since 1999. Mostly professional with Part 135 and Part 91 operations. And occasionally for my own pleasure. I plan to use my newly acquired Airplane to fly back to the islands often in the near future a lot.

Since these days we are required to file an EApis report leaving and entering the USA, I have seen a myriad of solutions over the years, to transfer the information of aircraft, crew and passengers to the CBP for processing. Mostly cumbersome, time consuming programs at best.

There are a few great service providors that will do it all for you in the GA bussiness, but they are for the large aircraft operators and they are very expensive services. These days smart phones can do nearly all aviation related tasks at a much lower cost.

During the Sun and Fun last Thursday I roamed the hangars and met Arturo Guerra from http://www.FlashPass.net 
In all the Apps I have seen and used this one is the most user friendly by far.

You will have to register with the EApis website to create your own profile.
https://eapis.cbp.dhs.gov/auth/login...Feapis%2Flogin

Then you create you FlashApp profile either on the website or via the App. Once that has been created you are golden.
The FlashPass app (IOS or Android) will take you information and file the required EApis reports and directly emailing you the conformation back because Flashpass is a CBP approved provider directly linking your information.
Your data of owner and plane is already in the App and you can file in less then a minute. No need to retype everything like on the government Eapis website.

This app is great, it has a scanning function that you aim at the lower portion of the passport picture page with all those codes and the App will populate all the fields required to add that person as a passenger or crew member to the trip. That functionality makes this App the winner.

Flashpass is 30 day free to use and if you sign up via Giovanna at g@lobolabs.com she will honor the Mooney space discount with the code: SNF19 that you will provide her with. With that code you will get an extra 3 months free added to your subscription when you pay for your membership. 


I have not seen this kind of useful application with any of the competitors, and this is much cheaper. We also get 16 months for a year subscription, so it the winnning one for me.

Anyone who is into flying internationally and needs Eapis, use this one. Try it FREE for 30 days !!
The owner is Arturo Guerra and can be reached at 956 948 2000 and his email is aguerra@lobolabs.com 

Good Luck everyone, meet me in the Bahamas !

Eric

 

Edited April 11, 2019 by Ericthepilot

[flyboy0681]

If I didn't know any better I would say this is an ad.

[201er]

You’re in the wrong place. This is a Mooney forum. They’ll use the 30 day trial on their next trip and then go back to eapis as soon as it starts costing money.

[thinwing]

Snort,,!!Come on....we do it no probs with HMS app.....

[carusoam]

1) I live in South Florida for the last 26 years.

2) And I have flown to the Bahamas since 1999.

3) Mostly professional with Part 135 and Part 91 operations.

4) And occasionally for my own pleasure.

5) I plan to use my newly acquired Beech to fly back to the islands often in the near future a lot.

 

Parsing the quirkiest post of the night....

1) There are 49 other great states in the US to live in...

2) Would it be better if you flew to the Bahamas in 1998?

3) Should people somehow identify with you because you are a commercial pilot? Or, fly occasionally for pleasure..?

5) I lost interest when our new friend started boasting about flying over large expanses of water in a new to him plane... a lot...

I get the feeling the ad police have reported this one...

Best regards,

-a-

 

[M20F]

I do like Flashpass though. 

[Ericthepilot]

Yes, I am plugging the best thing since sliced bread. All the hassles of private aviation crossing borders are greatly reduced with this app.

The message is too all AVIATORS. I don't discriminate to what you fly, I do want to save time and aggravation with government websites.

But let the armchair police be the better person, if aviation pilots are not there to help each other. My mooney friends can take it or leave it. Not my problem.

To all others, I say: get smarter  !

[skydvrboy]

51 minutes ago, Ericthepilot said:

Yes, I am plugging the best thing since sliced bread. All the hassles of private aviation crossing borders are greatly reduced with this app.

The message is too all AVIATORS. I don't discriminate to what you fly, I do want to save time and aggravation with government websites.

But let the armchair police be the better person, if aviation pilots are not there to help each other. My mooney friends can take it or leave it. Not my problem.

To all others, I say: get smarter  !

And to you I say... pay to be a supporter of this site or get your ads off of it!

[carusoam]

Back in the early stages of advertising... the more you said the name, it was believed people would buy the product...

I like IKE, Ike, Ike, Ike...

 

Ads evolved.... to include....  If you are like me... buy my product...

 

Then there are tech guys that have a good product, but have no clue how to bring it to real people...

Our Cies guy struggled to avoid some quirky statements at first. The focus was on the other users, and nothing about the product...

 

If brand C pilots use this product, you lesser pilots, should buy my product...

 

The Cies guy had to put in some extra effort to find out what people really needed before anything got sold to Mooney owners...

 

So... for ETP... you haven’t done the work...

unless your intention was to get all the new owners, of brand B planes, in Florida, to take a look... then you just missed the target audience...

There are rules to follow regarding selling things around here... how much and where...

There is a guide on how to be part of the MS community... note the donate button at the bottom...

 

Skip the aggressive hype, lame marketing, and pot shots at government web sites... that doesn’t help get you where you want to be...

Really, how hard is it to beat sliced bread? Ever stop in to a Panera’s?

If Arturo has a good product... how is he going to entice people to take a look at it?

most people see errant click bait as a way to get a computer virus... tough competition lately...

Best regards,

-a-

[mike_elliott]

humm...I roamed the grounds for a week at SNF and didnt run across this booth anywhere. Ill wait to for the avweb review, using the EAPIS system isnt too tough IMO. It is much harder for me to consider still yet another sub for something I dont really need. But who am I  to say, this might revolutionize GA much like the green new deal will.

[Ericthepilot]

בשוק סמייא צווחין לעווירא סגי נהור

[eman1200]

gesundheit

[bob865]

Even google translate can't help with that one: Bashuk Smiley Second Levira SGI Nurh

 

[Rustler]

בשוק סמייא צווחין לעווירא סגי נהור

~~  In the land of the blind, the Cyclops is king.

 

[Ericthepilot]

6 hours ago, eman1200 said:

gesundheit

Mazeltoff 

 

[Ericthepilot]

4 hours ago, Rustler said:

בשוק סמייא צווחין לעווירא סגי נהור

~~  In the land of the blind, the Cyclops is king.

 

Shalom

[rbridges]

On 4/10/2019 at 4:03 PM, Rustler said:

בשוק סמייא צווחין לעווירא סגי נהור

~~  In the land of the blind, the Cyclops is king.

 

How do you explain the mole king then? 

[Rustler]

I don't. I merely translated what the OP wrote.

[rbridges]

1 hour ago, Rustler said:

I don't. I merely translated what the OP wrote.

I didn't expect a serious answer.

[RobertE]

Boy, this is a tough, suspicious group!  I think the poster just wanted to put in a good word for an excellent app.  I, too, am going to speak up for FlashPass and will add a funny story.

Last summer I flew from California to Alaska via British Columbia and the Yukon. While in the Yukon I ran across an elderly gentleman in his Cessna 120 who had saved for his trip from Wisconsin to Alaska for, he said, a decade.  But there he was, stuck in Watson Lake for 2 days because he couldn’t figure out how the heck to complete the standard eApis form to be able to cross into the US at Northway, Alaska.  He had spent, without exaggeration, 48 hours trying to get it to work and by the time I met him he was genuinely considering turning around, giving up on his decade-long dream.  Well, I was then using FlashPass so I set him up on that app and 10 minutes later he accomplished what he earlier found impossible. To see his joy you would have thought I blessed him with eternal youth.  

[Rick Junkin]

Here's the piece that's missing, curiosity got the better of me.

From the Flashpass.net website:

Pricing

• 1 Year Subscription for Unlimited USA eApis submissions: $60.00 USD
• 1 Year Subscription for Unlimited MEXICO Apis submissions: $50.00 USD
  • notice: In order to submit a manifest to or from Mexico. A MEXICO + US Unlimited Subscription is required.
• For casual Flyiers (without Mexico APIS) we also offer Pay as You Go:
  • Single manifest submissions for : $9.99 USD
  • Five pack manifest submissions for : $39.99 USD

• Notes:
• Mexico Subscription is required for all flights to or from Mexico. A Mexico APIS manifest will be submitted to Mexico authorities.
• Pay As You Go users can ONLY submit manifests via the iPhone or iPad APP. AND WILL NOT BE ABLE TO SUBMIT A MANIFEST TO OR FROM MEXICO.

Cheers,
Rick

[yvesg]

I checked at work with some folks and they say with Microsoft Excel it is possible to generate an XML that is validated against a schema when using a template. I will investigate this a bit more and let you know.

eAPIS allows uploading XML however if you are not (very) computer litterate I would not attempt this!

These outfits that charge money only do this reading info from a database they created to store your info.

Yves

[yvesg]

I gave it a quick stab: I can import the schema in Excel and fill the fields however several ones have arbitrary codes that I am not aware of like the "doccode" these could be values or strings.... getting an XML with regular data from someone would help resolve this and other similar ones.

Yves

[kortopates]

51 minutes ago, yvesg said:

I gave it a quick stab: I can import the schema in Excel and fill the fields however several ones have arbitrary codes that I am not aware of like the "doccode" these could be values or strings.... getting an XML with regular data from someone would help resolve this and other similar ones.

Yves

 

That essentially what I've been doing since eAPIS started. I downloaded the XML schema and use an XML editor to edit it before each submission. Very few fields change between trips so this takes me only a few minutes and then I can submit it. I worked with some woman years ago at their office via email to get all I needed, but my recollection is that the schema is available for download. Their is another document I got that has all the validations in the schema - but I think they are all in the schema so the document is just additional documentation. 

Back in the early days the user interface was terrible and didn't allow you to save off much info for making future manifest. So my approach saved me lost of time. These days their interface has improved vastly plus their are lots of apps out there that do this much cheaper if not free - or so I am told by other pilots. But since I have my own solution I don't follow the other options.  When I did this when I was working, I used XML Spy, now that I am retired I just use a free Windows XML editor.

I might have to check out the Excel approach, but it looks like its just substituting Excel for the XML editor - but its critical that Excel be able to validate the XML manifest against the schema - not just provide a template. 

[carusoam]

On 4/17/2019 at 11:47 AM, RobertE said:

Boy, this is a tough, suspicious group!  I think the poster just wanted to put in a good word for an excellent app.  I, too, am going to speak up for FlashPass and will add a funny story.

Last summer I flew from California to Alaska via British Columbia and the Yukon. While in the Yukon I ran across an elderly gentleman in his Cessna 120 who had saved for his trip from Wisconsin to Alaska for, he said, a decade.  But there he was, stuck in Watson Lake for 2 days because he couldn’t figure out how the heck to complete the standard eApis form to be able to cross into the US at Northway, Alaska.  He had spent, without exaggeration, 48 hours trying to get it to work and by the time I met him he was genuinely considering turning around, giving up on his decade-long dream.  Well, I was then using FlashPass so I set him up on that app and 10 minutes later he accomplished what he earlier found impossible. To see his joy you would have thought I blessed him with eternal youth.  

That’s the kind of story needed to sell the app..!

There are many people that want free, and are willing to do the work themselves... CBs and tech people...

I tend to buy things from people on MS... after they introduce themselves...

The OP has left the door open for me to try harder to avoid needing the app.

I am willing to spend more for convenience... and would probably check details with AOPA... it just sounds too complex to be comfortable the first time...

Best regards,

-a-