Malaysians entering Singapore by vehicle can use a QR code to clear immigration starting from March 19

Thailand isn’t the only country to make it easier for Malaysians to clear immigration at land border checkpoints, as Singapore has announced that travellers arriving and departing Singapore by car via Woodlands and Tuas checkpoints can use QR codes instead of passports for faster and more convenient immigration clearance, starting from March 19.

According to the Singapore Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA), instead of handing their passports to ICA officers at the car counter, those entering Singapore by vehicle will only need to have scanned a single QR code which they generate before arriving at the checkpoint, for all the travellers in the car, Bernama reports.

Travellers will simply need to download the MyICA mobile application on their mobile device and populate their passport details in the application to generate a unique QR code. Foreign visitors who have visited Singapore before can use the built-in camera function within the MyICA mobile application to scan the Machine-Readable Zone (MRZ) of their passport biodata page to auto-populate their passport information, the ICA said.

However, first-time visitors and those re-entering Singapore using a different passport from their last visit to the country will need to present their physical passport for immigration clearance and will only be able to use a QR code for immigration clearance on their subsequent trips.

The ICA said that the QR code initiative would offer a faster and more convenient immigration clearance experience, with estimated time savings of around 20 seconds for cars with four travellers to approximately one minute for cars with 10 travellers. It added that travellers can still opt to present their physical passport to an ICA officer at the counter.

The agency said it plans to progressively extend the QR code clearance to the other clearance zones at the land checkpoints to allow travellers in other means of conveyance to also enjoy faster and more convenient immigration clearance.

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