New rules for British travellers to European countries
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00:00Seamus, could you just start off by telling us the new rules that are coming into place
00:06for British travellers? Just kind of summarise what this new ETIAS, EES passport scheme is
00:13and what people need to know about it.
00:16Absolutely. There's two different schemes, the EES and the ETIAS, and they're both quite
00:20different. They've both been delayed by several years at this point as well. So there's quite
00:24a lot of confusion as to what's going on there. The EES is the entry exit system. It's the
00:29new system that rather than stamping passports, when you go to a European country, you'll
00:35be going through an automated fingerprint biometric scanning system that will record your biometrics,
00:41put them on a database, that'll then be associated with your passport. And therefore, rather than
00:46having to talk to a border security guard and stamp your passport, you should be able to
00:49go through the gates automatically and easily. So that's the EES. ETIAS is a separate system
00:55which will come in probably six months after EES is finished bedding in. And that's a visa
01:01waiver scheme, which will cost a little bit of money for anyone who's outside the EU to
01:06enter the EU and stay. So a British holidaymaker, anyone from the UK will need to buy the ETIAS
01:12scheme in due course.
01:15So what would it kind of be like, you know, when you go to America and you get a visa, is
01:19it going to be something a little bit like that when you go to EU countries?
01:23So the ETIAS is very much like the US ESTA, yes. If you've ever gone to the US and bought
01:29their visa waiver scheme, to go to the US, depending where you're flying in from, they
01:33will require you to have a visa. But if you're coming from the UK or a number of countries
01:37with which they have relatively cordial relations, you can simply buy the visa waiver, which is
01:42the US ESTA. And the EU ETIAS is very much modelled on that. It's a very similar scheme.
01:48Once you've bought it for a few pounds, it's currently going to cost about £6, £7. Once
01:52you've bought it, you'll be able to go in and out of the EU on that visa waiver, yes.
01:56I mean, the good news is they're going to phase this implementation and it will take a little
01:59while for any of it to bed in. So in October, they'll start to implement the EES. It will
02:05probably take six months of that implementation to be complete. Six months after that, they're
02:09likely to start implementing the ETIAS, which is the paid visa waiver scheme. So actually,
02:13there's going to be nothing to pay for anyone flying to the EU this year, probably nothing
02:18to pay for almost anyone flying to the EU next year. But when this starts to actually become
02:22a problem for people insofar as it does is likely 2027. So holidays this year, holidays
02:28next year entirely hassle free.