Introduction of European Entry-Exit Scheme (EES)

[Mag_seven]

In Rome the other day (on exiting) I was directed to an e gate and then got an exit stamp. I don't know whether this was an "EES" e gate as I have used e gates followed by stamps in Italy before the EES rollout started.

 

[Howardh]

Think tomorrow, 7th, is the day they bring in the "35%" rule where 35% of entrants must be EES'd (although not sure if that includes those already done?) although I can't see that happening at all. I suppose it's the quiet season tourist-wise other than the ski resorts/Olympics and winter-sun destinations, but with Easter approaching what then? Push back the 100% that's supposed to come in April??

 

[WestCoast]

Time to leave the Canaries tomorrow via Tenerife South - I am expecting the worse after my arrival experience.

I got lucky arriving there on Christmas Eve in that my flight was sent straight to the egates to skip the kiosks but it seems in future you’ll go to the kiosks (if not registered) then the egates in Spain. I dread to think how chaotic the likes of Malaga and Palma will be in the summer with the amount of infrequent UK travellers arriving, one report I read was saying the Spanish Government are going to deploy private security at the border to bolster the police numbers.

 

[FinsburyPark]

I notice in Berlin you can only use E Gates if you have a German residence permit. I asked can someone with a residence permit for other EU countries use them (eg: Luxembourg, Spain). I was told it was German only for residence permit option.

 

[MalaiseForever]

I got lucky arriving there on Christmas Eve in that my flight was sent straight to the egates to skip the kiosks but it seems in future you’ll go to the kiosks (if not registered) then the egates in Spain. I dread to think how chaotic the likes of Malaga and Palma will be in the summer with the amount of infrequent UK travellers arriving, one report I read was saying the Spanish Government are going to deploy private security at the border to bolster the police numbers.

To be fair it was fine on the return but entering was a shambles. I won’t be rushing back anytime soon.

 

[scarby]

one report I read was saying the Spanish Government are going to deploy private security at the border to bolster the police numbers.

Good to see the authorities focusing security on where it's needed - on law-abiding citizens coming to a country to put money into its economy.

 

[styles]

One mildly comedic thing I noticed on the EU web pages for EES FAQs:

How does the Entry/Exit System (EES) apply to the Withdrawal Agreement beneficiaries and their joining family members?

"beneficiaries"? I'm not even sure a majority of the population would agree with that descriptor any more!

 

[island]

One mildly comedic thing I noticed on the EU web pages for EES FAQs:



"beneficiaries"? I'm not even sure a majority of the population would agree with that descriptor any more!

"Withdrawal agreement beneficiaries" refers to UK citizens resident in the EU who lived there prior to Brexit and benefit from the continued right of residence under the agreements.

 

[styles]

"Withdrawal agreement beneficiaries" refers to UK citizens resident in the EU who lived there prior to Brexit and benefit from the continued right of residence under the agreements.

I see! Ok that actually makes a lot more sense then, because when I read it I thought it to be very odd choice of wording!

 

[FinsburyPark]

A Brit is Spain is predicting that EES won't fully finalise by April

 

[bleeder4]

A Brit is Spain is predicting that EES won't fully finalise by April

Yes, a lot of the papers are saying the same today. Here's The Telegraph's take on it.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/news/eu-airport-fingerprint-scheme-worse/

The project to capture every British citizen’s fingerprints and facial biometrics at the EU border has been anything but smooth. And it’s about to get much worse.

After three years of delays, Europe’s Entry/Exit System (EES) finally launched in October. However, the Port of Dover paused the EES process before it even began, Portugal has recently reverted to manual stamps, and there have been hours-long queues at airports such as Malaga.

As of Friday, things will become even more hectic at EU border points. The previous benchmark, that 10 per cent of all travellers must be checked at the border, dials up to 35 per cent of passengers. By April 10, that threshold rises to 100 per cent. If the EES rollout is currently a shambles, it’s about to become a disaster.

The purpose of the EES is to improve and modernise the border control systems across the 29 Schengen Area countries. By capturing biometric data (facial images and fingerprints), the EES is designed to work alongside security databases to combat criminals, catch “overstayers” and identify bogus travel documents. It is, effectively, a hi-tech overhaul of outdated manual checks and stamps. Eventually, it should help to speed up border checks.

However, the process of capturing passenger data has been slowed down by failed kiosks, staffing issues and software hiccups. At the Port of Dover, the planned introduction of EES checks on car passengers was abruptly postponed in November and still hasn’t come into effect. The French authorities are in charge of implementing the EES technology at Dover and Eurostar.

There have also been complications at UK terminals, with French authorities insisting on including superfluous questions at the kiosks, including demands for proof of accommodation, travel insurance and evidence of a return ticket. These were promptly dropped, amid fears they could cause delays.

Where it has been imposed, the rollout of the EES has resulted in border control processing times increasing by up to 70 per cent, with waiting times of up to three hours at peak traffic periods, says Olivier Jankovec, director general at ACI Europe, a trade association.

“This is wreaking significant discomfort on travellers and creating operational disruptions for airports,” Jankovec says.

Saj Ahmad, chief analyst at StrategicAero Research, adds: “I would not characterise this rollout as anything other than a mess, and we aren’t even in the thrust of the real busy season, which is summer.

“EES is clearly struggling to make good on its promise to ensure European travel is seamless. If anything, we’ve seen increased queues at immigration desks, a lack of immigration staff, huge passenger queues, anger and frustration.”

This month, Portuguese authorities paused EES checks at Lisbon Airport due to the hours-long queues caused by the biometric checks. There have been similar delays at popular holiday airports including Alicante and Malaga.

Airport bosses said they would use the three-month pause to expand EES equipment at the border by 30 per cent. In doing so, under the current schedule, Lisbon will be forced to go from checking zero to 100 per cent of passengers when its EES kiosks are rebooted in April.

The idea was that the gradual rollout of EES, staggered across a six-month period, would prevent significant disruption at borders.

This grace period effectively ends on Friday, January 9, when the proportion of passengers who must go through EES checks increases from 10 per cent to 35 per cent at all European borders.

Jankovec says: “Unless all the operational issues are fully resolved within the coming weeks, increasing the registration threshold to 35 per cent as of January 9 – as required by the EES implementation calendar – will inevitably result in much more severe congestion and systemic disruption for airports and airlines.

“This will possibly involve serious safety hazards and a deterioration of the passenger experience and the image of the European and national regulators.”

Border authorities do have the ability to temporarily pause EES checks, when required. Mark Tanzer, Chief Executive of ABTA, urged airport bosses to do all they can to minimise delays: “They have contingency measures at their disposal – such as standing down the system or limiting checks – and we want them to be utilised to help manage the flow of people.”

The EES rollout was originally planned for the first half of 2022, before being postponed numerous times to May 2023, late 2023, November 2024 and then October 2025.

It is now hard to imagine a scenario where the April 10 full rollout deadline is not pushed back. Beyond that, airport bosses will be looking nervously ahead to the influx of arrivals in the peak summer months, with many British families having not submitted their biometrics until that point.

“It’s actually pretty shocking that the plans to press ahead have not been reined in or reassessed,” says Ahmad. “Going up to 35 per cent has disaster written all over it. The problems will magnify and multiply and, sadly, it’ll be the travelling public who’ll suffer from that.”

 

[gswindale]

I thought it was 100% already - certainly seemed that way in Finland last month - was definitely everybody off the 2 planes that arrived when we did that went through the whole rigmarole.

Typical Torygraph garbage here though

The project to capture every British citizen’s fingerprints and facial biometrics at the EU border

It's not just the British - it's everybody who isn't an EU citizen.

 

[MalaiseForever]

I thought it was 100% already - certainly seemed that way in Finland last month - was definitely everybody off the 2 planes that arrived when we did that went through the whole rigmarole.

Typical Torygraph garbage here though

It's not just the British - it's everybody who isn't an EU citizen.

The Finnish border guard I spoke to last week said the EU are making them enrol everyone every time until the system goes live. I think I’ve done it 3 times now…

 

[FinsburyPark]

There are only 2 ways the EES backlogs will not happen this summer.

1) The EU postpone full roll out to a date past 12 April

2) Starmer is in a new set of negotiations with the EU when it comes to 'resetting the relationship'. Maybe he could seek some kind of arrangement with the EU on some sort of partial or full EES exemption for Brits. Maybe some concession could be offered in return. Yes its unlikely, but it depend on how good the art of deal making is*

Its no secret that the biggest users pf EES will be Brits.

I hold an EU member state passport as well as UK, so I'm just watching from the sidelines.

Whatever happens, it will be intersting to see how it all pans out.

 

[cactustwirly]

There are only 2 ways the EES backlogs will not happen this summer.

1) The EU postpone full roll out to a date past 12 April

2) Starmer is in a new set of negotiations with the EU when it comes to 'resetting the relationship'. Maybe he could seek some kind of arrangement with the EU on some sort of partial or full EES exemption for Brits. Maybe some concession could be offered in return. Yes its unlikely, but it depend on how good the art of deal making is*

Its no secret that the biggest users pf EES will be Brits.

I hold an EU member state passport as well as UK, so I'm just watching from the sidelines.

Whatever happens, it will be intersting to see how it all pans out.

Well the port of Dover will be an almighty mess once EES rolls out, that's why I suspect it has been delayed

 

[FinsburyPark]

Well the port of Dover will be an almighty mess once EES rolls out, that's why I suspect it has been delayed

I one million percent suspect the same.

The delaying of the roll out at this location is a gigantic 'canary in the coalmine' moment.

 

[stadler]

The simplest solution would be for the UK and EU to agree to a deal that exempts UK citizens from both EES and ETIAS and in return citizens of the 34 Mainland European countries (Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Vatican City) are exempted from the UK ETA scheme and any future UK EES equivalent that we introduce. It seems like a no brainer to agree to such a deal as it benefits both sides (both the UK and the Mainland Eurpean countries) in so many ways.

Canada and the USA have a deal that exempts USA citizens from the Canada ETA visa scheme and in return exempts Canada citizens from the ESTA visa scheme. So if they can make such an agreement than i so no reason why we can not.

Plus it is worth pointing out that Andorra and Monaco and San Marino and Vatican City citizens are exempted from both EES and ETIAS despite not being members of any of the Schengen or EU or EFTA or EEA agreements. So it proves that exemptions can be made.

It will be utter chaos once EES and ETIAS are both fully in use. Our ferry ports in particular will struggle so much especially as they do not have much space and this will massively slow down the processing of travellers.

 

[FinsburyPark]

The simplest solution would be for the UK and EU to agree to a deal that exempts UK citizens from both EES and ETIAS and in return citizens of the 34 Mainland European countries (Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Vatican City) are exempted from the UK ETA scheme and any future UK EES equivalent that we introduce. It seems like a no brainer to agree to such a deal as it benefits both sides (both the UK and the Mainland Eurpean countries) in so many ways.

Canada and the USA have a deal that exempts USA citizens from the Canada ETA visa scheme and in return exempts Canada citizens from the ESTA visa scheme. So if they can make such an agreement than i so no reason why we can not.

Plus it is worth pointing out that Andorra and Monaco and San Marino and Vatican City citizens are exempted from both EES and ETIAS despite not being members of any of the Schengen or EU or EFTA or EEA agreements. So it proves that exemptions can be made.

It will be utter chaos once EES and ETIAS are both fully in use. Our ferry ports in particular will struggle so much especially as they do not have much space and this will massively slow down the processing of travellers.

I made a petition to this end

Petition: Seek a UK-EU deal to scrap the Entry/Exit System for travel under 90 days

We ask the Government to work with the EU to seek a deal to prevent UK citizens needing ETIAS when visiting the EU for 90 days or less, and to drop the requirements for EU citizens needing an ETA as well for less than 90 days.

petition.parliament.uk

Its now closed but we could have done a deal with the EU to gain us an exemption while giving EU/EEA/Schengen area citizens better rights while visiting the UK.

Many mocked me (on facebook and reddit) for "British Exceptionalism" but quickly stopped once I said I am an EU member state passport holder and feel EU++ citizens are getting a bit of a raw deal with having to do ETA when coming here.


These petitions are live, both created by me

Petition: Allow all EU, EEA and Swiss nationals to enter UK with ID card

We are looking for the Government to find a way to change entry rules so that all EU nationals can enter the UK for immigration purposes on their ID cards.

petition.parliament.uk

And

Petition: Create a voluntary physical national ID card

With the advent of the up and coming EES system in Europe, we are asking for a Government ID card system similar to current EU member state ID cards.

petition.parliament.uk

 

[scarby]

I'm not the first on this forum to say this, but when authorities introduce something, I want to see it clearly and transparently laid out what the concrete benefits are for all stakeholders versus the cost and effort of implementing it.

At the moment EES is massively on the debit side on all counts, having achieved precisely nothing while wasting thousands and thousands of law-abiding travellers thousands and thousands of hours waiting in line when they could have been doing something productive instead.

It's going to have to be one hell of a brilliant system to claw back that alone.

 

[Djgr]

I'm not the first on this forum to say this, but when authorities introduce something, I want to see it clearly and transparently laid out what the concrete benefits are for all stakeholders versus the cost and effort of implementing it.

At the moment EES is massively on the debit side on all counts, having achieved precisely nothing while wasting thousands and thousands of law-abiding travellers thousands and thousands of hours waiting in line when they could have been doing something productive instead.

It's going to have to be one hell of a brilliant system to claw back that alone.

I believe that BoJo was pushing for this...which explains a lot!

 

[FinsburyPark]

I'm not the first on this forum to say this, but when authorities introduce something, I want to see it clearly and transparently laid out what the concrete benefits are for all stakeholders versus the cost and effort of implementing it.

At the moment EES is massively on the debit side on all counts, having achieved precisely nothing while wasting thousands and thousands of law-abiding travellers thousands and thousands of hours waiting in line when they could have been doing something productive instead.

It's going to have to be one hell of a brilliant system to claw back that alone.

If they go full steam ahead or will be just like the USA where an arrival at JFK can take 20 mins on a good day and 2 hours on a bad day to clear passport control*.

*according to google as I have never been to the USA.

Lets be real, EES more or less mirrors the system they have in the states (for arriving passengers). The only substantial difference to EES os the USA doesnt appear to have exit passport control.

 

[Bald Rick]

If they go full steam ahead or will be just like the USA where an arrival at JFK can take 20 mins on a good day and 2 hours on a bad day to clear passport control*.

My last trip to JFK was a 90minute wait at border control. But I have known it to be almost 0 mins. Flights leaving the UK earlier tend to be better.

I have my first EES experience coming up, will report back. I’m not holding out much hope.

 

[Djgr]

My last trip to JFK was a 90minute wait at border control. But I have known it to be almost 0 mins. Flights leaving the UK earlier tend to be better.

I have my first EES experience coming up, will report back. I’m not holding out much hope.

Palma yesterday. Compulsorily queued to use EES machine. Recognised that I have already been registered and told me to go on through egates. Went through egates and then had to get passport stamped by human.

So all very Heath Robinson (as expected if BoJo had any involvement)

 

[FinsburyPark]

Palma yesterday. Compulsarily queued to use EES machine. Recognised that I have already been registered and told me to go on through egates. Went through egates and then had to get passport stamped by human.

This could work.

If it could be adapted that you only register once, and once registered, you dont have to do the machines again for 3 years from the date of last travel to schengen or when your passpirt expires, whichever comes sooner.

This would dramatically decrease the lines.

The regording of entries and exits could be done at the actual border controls themselves much like they have done beforehand. This time instead of the stamp, its a log in a computer system.

If Palma airport is happy to do it that way, it shows it *can* be done that way.

 

[Mag_seven]

Is there any way of finding out if your passport has actually been registered into the new system and what it has recorded re entrances and exits so far?

 

[FinsburyPark]

Is there any way of finding out if your passport has actually been registered into the new system and what it has recorded re entrances and exits so far?

Right now, to my knowlegde, there isn't.

Thats not to say the EU might not make a website checker tool, much like the 90 days calendar. We shall have to wait and see on that.

That said its 3 years since the date of last travel to from the EU, or when your passport expires. This gives most people a lot of time out from having to register on the machines endlessly of the Palma Airport solution were to be enacted EU wide, and more imporatantly would decrease the lines over time.

Yes there would be a great line in Summer 2026, but once all those people have registered, the Palma Airport solution would cut down lines for future trips.

 

[Class73Electro]

If they go full steam ahead or will be just like the USA where an arrival at JFK can take 20 mins on a good day and 2 hours on a bad day to clear passport control*.

*according to google as I have never been to the USA.

Lets be real, EES more or less mirrors the system they have in the states (for arriving passengers). The only substantial difference to EES os the USA doesnt appear to have exit passport control.

Trouble is USA I believe is for flights only? We have a lot of sea borders, with ports with limited space. This system works... OK in airports. Ferry terminals with maybe 6 people in car, its not going to be fun - it already took some time to get out of the smaller ports.

 

[JamesT]

Trouble is USA I believe is for flights only? We have a lot of sea borders, with ports with limited space. This system works... OK in airports. Ferry terminals with maybe 6 people in car, its not going to be fun - it already took some time to get out of the smaller ports.

No, ESTA is for all. https://www.cbp.gov/travel/internat...iver-program-vwp-and-electronic-system-travel

All eligible nationals or citizens of VWP countries who plan to travel to the United States for temporary business or pleasure under VWP are required to receive an authorization through ESTA prior to boarding a U.S.-bound airplane or vessel or presenting themselves for admission at a United States land border port of entry. The term "United States" refers to the continental United States, Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands of the United States, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.

 

[ninja-lewis]

Right now, to my knowlegde, there isn't.

Thats not to say the EU might not make a website checker tool, much like the 90 days calendar. We shall have to wait and see on that.

There will be an app for ETIAS so could integrate a checker into that. More secure than a website as the app could require reading the biometric chip on your passport (proving you have it) as opposed to just relying on entering details on a website.

 

[Class73Electro]

No, ESTA is for all. https://www.cbp.gov/travel/internat...iver-program-vwp-and-electronic-system-travel

Fair enough. My point still stands that the main entry method to the US will be via plane - not quite so with Europe