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New Requirements to Travel to Europe
- eimrine 3y ago> You will need a payment card to cover the EUR 7 fee. You can use a variety of online payment options to pay the fee. And no cash options?
- the_mitsuhiko 3y agoHow do you want to put cash into your computer?
- eddtries 3y agoSend it in the post, with tracking, then fax the proof of sending it to their head office. If the fax machine is broken request an Avian alternative.
- jorge-d 3y agoIf you can pay your plane ticket online I'm sure you can do so with the ETIAS as well.
- askonomm 3y agoPeople still use cash in the modern world? I haven't needed it in years. Don't know anybody else either (Estonia).
- patrickk 3y agoA huge percentage of daily life in Germany (Europe's biggest economy) and Austria is conducted in cash. https://www.bundesbank.de/en/press/press-releases/payment-behaviour-in-germany-in-2021-894120 https://www.bundesbank.de/en/press/press-releases/payment-be...
- askonomm 3y agoWell Germany isn't really considered modern by northern EU standards, as would most northern EU citizens tell you. Don't know about Austria however.
- mk89 3y agoIn Germany you can pay by card basically anywhere - with the phone or watch as well in most/many shops as far as I know. Not sure all this criticism makes sense (no I am not German). There are also historical reasons why Germans are concerned about the possibility of being tracked, which apparently not everyone sees the dangers of.
- patrickk 3y ago> In Germany you can pay by card basically anywhere - with the phone or watch as well in most/many shops as far as I know. This simply isn't true, outside of large chains or supermarkets. Many smaller businesses like pubs, "kiosks", barbers, non-chain restaurants, and so on, are cash only. It's a combination of tax avoidance and trying to avoid the insane level of paperwork needed for bascically every aspect of life, but especially if you have a business, no matter how small. Source: live in Germany, near a large metro area.
- mk89 3y ago> This simply isn't true, outside of large chains or supermarkets. Many smaller businesses like pubs, "kiosks", barbers, non-chain restaurants, and so on, are cash only. I have a different experience. I pay by card even for < 1 eur things almost everywhere (from time to time): sometimes I just have no cash with me anymore and I am totally ok. This has changed dramatically in the last 10 years, and I wish that the mainstream theme was different than "wooooow in Germany they still accept cash-only". Until now I only experienced this "cash-only" limitation in very few places. My recommendation, though, is to always have some cash on you, especially if you don't know where you're going. But I would do the same in any other country in the world.
- cdot2 3y agonot everyone wants to give their identity to every street vendor to buy a taco
- eddtries 3y agoHow am I giving my identity to a street vendor when I pay without cash?
- atemerev 3y agoTo a street vendor, you don’t. To any authorized government agency that have power to ask the street vendor about the transaction that happened, and the bank for your personal details linked to the credit card number, you do. Also to any interested party who can compile the information from numerous PII leaks.
- currysausage 3y agoWhen the payment terminal asks the EMV chip on your payment card for tag no. 5F20, it will be told the Cardholder Name [1]. That, in connection with your PAN [2], is a pretty stable identifier. (Not if you are using prepaid cards, obviously.) [1] https://emvlab.org/emvtags/show/t5F20/ https://emvlab.org/emvtags/show/t5F20/ [2] https://emvlab.org/emvtags/show/t5A/ https://emvlab.org/emvtags/show/t5A/
- eddtries 3y agoWhat if I pay with my phone? That’s pretty common in the Nordic countries (Swish)
- currysausage 3y agoApple/Google Pay also implement the EMV standards, so at least in theory, it shouldn’t make a difference. In practice, I don’t know and I can’t check, unfortunately. It’s possible that they chose not to implement this particular tag. I did query the chip on my plastic MC Debit and it definitely reveals my name.
- RandomLensman 3y agoPlenty in use in some EU countries (Germamy comes to mind).
- askonomm 3y agoLike mentioned in another reply here, Germany is quite outdated when it comes to these things, and I wouldn't consider Germany a modern country (by northern European standards).
- ghaff 3y agoI was just in Spain and mostly just used a card but, anecdotally, it looked like the norm was paying for meals/drinks with cash. There's a lot of variation in Europe.
- askonomm 3y agoOddly it seems to me the further south you go, the less modern things get. Is there some correlation with the climate or something?
- RandomLensman 3y agoNo. Partially, modernity was paid for by other countries and less legacy (some new EU members), the classic Nordics are all high tax and small - so consensus is easy. In large countries the cost of changing things and supporting laggards is also much higher (and a few % opposition is a lot of people in Germany or Italy, for example)
- RandomLensman 3y agoThere is just no desire in Germany to go there. That said, why is Estonia still a net EU receiver of funds then?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- walthamstow 3y agoJust come back from Japan, cash is still king there. It's a weird country, so advanced yet so backwards on some stuff. I haven't dealt with so many coins for years.
- schube 3y agoFrom the information I could gather the only payment option is debit/credit card. If this is accurate it looks particularly exclusionary to me because one cannot expect each and every one of the 1.4 billion (according to the linked page) affected people have or can have a bank account. Also this creates unwritten requirements to traveling to the EU: 1. You must have a bank account. 2. Mastercard/Visas/$otherPaymentProcessor will be aware of your application. I don’t have an issue with these payment methods being available, I take issue with them being the only available methods. Countries’ immigration departments have no business compelling travellers into a contract with a private entity (the bank), and I also believe their dealings with european immigration departments shouldn’t be exposed to foreign payment processors. At the very least cash payment at a local embassy should be an option.
- dzhiurgis 3y agoI'm sure friends or travel agent can pay for you? And if anyone in the embassy has any shred of empathy (they tend to as they deal with lost people all the time) I'm sure they would too.
- Tommstein 3y agoYou should be aware that Estonia is a tiny country and not representative of the other 99.99% of the world (albeit in a good way; I'm not from there but have informed many people it's probably the most advanced country in the world as far as domestic life).
- piva00 3y agoI didn't have the option for cash payment either when applying for my ESTA. So yeah, no cash option.
- justinzollars 3y ago> ETIAS travel authorisation is an entry requirement for visa-exempt nationals travelling to any of these 30 European countries. It is linked to a traveller’s passport. It is valid for up to three years or until the passport expires
- red_admiral 3y agoEurope is getting its own version of the Visa Waiver Program.
- yuppiepuppie 3y agoThis seems more analogous to ESTA than the Visa Waiver Program. Europe has already had the waiver in place for exempt countries for a while.
- cyberpunk 3y ago> The rules of travel to Europe have changed. Starting in mid-2025, some 1.4 billion people from over 60 visa-exempt countries are required to have a travel authorization to enter most European countries. I don't remember voting for this....
- gizajob 3y agoI assume you're in Europe. Voting and democracy aren't it's strong point. Did you vote for Ursula Von Der Leyden as your president?
- diggan 3y agoIf you didn't vote in your country's election, then yeah, you probably didn't vote for it. But otherwise, you did. It's just that Europe operates under representative democracy rather than direct democracy.
- soco 3y agoTechnically if your voted representative didn't get elected then indeed you didn't vote for this. But the elected person technically still represents you as an equal rights citizen. So yes, your representative can do things for which you didn't vote.
- diggan 3y agoThe agreement we have in a representative democracy is that even if someone who didn't vote wins, they still represent me and I accept this, as otherwise it wouldn't be much of a democracy at all :)
- Tommstein 3y agoThey said that they didn't vote for this, not that whoever passed it didn't officially represent them.
- orwin 3y agoIt's literally immigration control, which is what the new version of the PPE stand for (it moved quite a bit right on this particular issue), and what a lot of european country voted for.
- crtracker 3y agoWasn't this slated to start in 2024? Was it delayed?
- kenny11 3y agoOne reason given is that it was delayed so it wouldn't interfere with travel to the 2024 Olympics in Paris.
- vr46 3y agoI think this is because of the sketchy way in which passports for various tax havens, Caribbean countries, etc (not mutually exclusive) have been sold and bought and those passports allowed visa-free access to the EU. The corruption in those countries puts the EU borders at risk, hence these new rules. Sauce: https://www.occrp.org/en/dominica-passports-of-the-caribbean/investigation-reveals-thousands-who-bought-golden-passports-from-dominica https://www.occrp.org/en/dominica-passports-of-the-caribbean...
- ginko 3y agoIt's a tit-for-tat response to ESTA.
- orwin 3y agoIt's way cheaper and dure 50% longuer, so i don't know. Imho it's just another McKinsey idea. How i envision the discussion: """ - Most of our illegal immigrants entered legally within our borders, quick find us a new revolutionnary idea! - Hey, we have this ETIAS idea. bla bla.... .... bla bla... So it's nothing at all like ESTA at all (two hour presentation) - Nice, here's 5 million """
- vr46 3y agoYeah, ETIAS has been discussed since Brexit in 2016, I worked for the UK Home Office just after that period and “tit-for-tat” is a lazy and naive response to the issues around human trafficking and other concerns we were trying to address in the UK. The response was obviously delayed by a lot of Brexit negotiation faff, but there’s long been worries about golden passports both within the EU and externally being used to wander in and out of the EU and Schengen.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- cbg0 3y agoAside from standardizing this process across the entire EU, this seems to be a tourism tax which will bring in several billion euros yearly.
- fidotron 3y agoIt looks like part of this is to do with some Balkan nations and non-biometric passports. For instance, coming from Bosnia if you had a biometric passport you would need ETIAS, otherwise a full actual visa, but if you are actually on a Bosnian passport you must use ETIAS, which implies you are compelled to use a biometric passport. This makes me think there is something off about users of non-biometric passports in that area.
- infotainment 3y agoFor those who don't know, the US requires every foreign visitor to get approved for entry via ESTA, which is basically a visa in every conceivable way except that they don't call it one. It's also essentially identical to ETIAS, the system mentioned in this article. IMO, ESTA is and has always been always a blatant violation of the Visa Wavier treaty, so it's not unreasonable for Europe to respond in kind.
- setgree 3y agoThe fact that the US did it first doesn’t make it reasonable. Both policies can be bad on their own terms, and either way, the costs will almost entirely be borne by people who had nothing to do with drafting the US policy in the first place.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- jacknews 3y agoSo, no longer visa exempt, in all but name.
- GracefullyBlind 3y agoDon't compare the process of going online and filling out a form to applying to an actual visa in a consulate
- jacknews 3y agoWhy not, plenty of countries offer online visa applications. This ESTA, sorry ETIAS thing is simply a visa with another name, albeit maybe a 'visa-lite'.
- throw0101a 3y ago> Don't compare the process of going online and filling out a form […] Going online and filling out a form is exactly how you get a visa for (e.g.) NZ: * https://www.immigration.govt.nz/new-zealand-visas/preparing-a-visa-application/the-application-process/applying-for-a-visa-online https://www.immigration.govt.nz/new-zealand-visas/preparing-...
- dzhiurgis 3y agoAll my visas in NZ had to be done via post which was somehow superior experience to using Lithuanian e-government (which are basically extremely hard to access web forms designed pre-mobile era which just lands and some clarks email inbox who will then say "yeah nah you still need to come visit us in the office")
- tommiegannert 3y agoMost importantly: paying an exorbitant fee for adding a row to a database. $21 for the chance of filling out the ESTA with the exact same data I used the last time.
- cogogo 3y agoOur children are US citizens and Spanish citizens and we live in the US. When we book flights to Spain to visit family we always use their US passport details to ensure we aren’t denied boarding returning home due to lack of an ESTA. I can already imagine the inverse and an over-zealous ticket or gate agent denying boarding to Spain because of no ETIAS and not accepting the physical Spanish passport because it’s not on the electronic reservation.
- fmobus 3y agoI don't think what you said in the last sentence is going to be an issue. Each check-in can be handled separately: you check-in to Spain with the Spanish passport, you check-in to the US with the American passport. There will probably be a box in the reservation system to say "I don't need ETIAS/ESTA"
- yuppiepuppie 3y agoYeah, Im dual US/Swedish citizen, and the check in is isolated each time. I present my US passport when going to the US and my Swedish Passport when going to the EU. No biggie and never had any trouble throughout my life.
- flemhans 3y agoSo in the Schengen logs, it seems like you keep entering Sweden (or wherever you transit) but never leave it? Or do you show your Swedish passport on leaving Schengen?
- jplrssn 3y agoNot OP, but in my experience they will look for a Schengen entry stamp during the exit control. Showing e.g. a Swedish passport for border entry and exit, and a US passport for check-in works fine.
- desert_rue 3y agoThe air carrier is responsible for taking the passenger(s) back if they are denied entry into a country. So the airlines will deal with many people falsely checking the box (“I am a blank; I don’t need it!”) and remove the checkbox immediately.
- throwingrocks 3y agoLooks like the application process will take a few minutes online. Why is this news right now?
- akmarinov 3y agoThe European Commission should’ve implemented visas for the US as they require visas from some of the EU’s members. They made Canada waive visa for all members by threatening to impose visas on Canadians, but are too chicken to do the same with the US. The EU parliament has voted that it should be done multiple times, but the Commission refuses to act.
- throw0101a 3y agoThe reason why Canada imposed visa requirements on some EU countries: > Canada imposed the visa on the two countries as well as the Czech Republic to stop an influx of bogus refugee claimants among ethnic Roma applicants. > The Czech visa requirement ended last year, but Immigration Minister Chris Alexander said at the time the Romanian and Bulgarian ones would remain because of continued concerns over human smuggling and organized criminal gangs. * https://macleans.ca/news/canada/visa-obstacle-looms-as-harper-heralds-end-of-canada-eu-free-trade-talks/ https://macleans.ca/news/canada/visa-obstacle-looms-as-harpe... Starting in 2025 Canadians will need to get an ETIAS: > From 2025, Canadians will need to register with ETIAS to enter the Schengen Area, Cyprus, Bulgaria and Romania without a visa. * https://www.etias.ca https://www.etias.ca The verbiage that ETIAS "is not a visa" is strong: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Travel_Information_and_Authorisation_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Travel_Information_an...
- tamimio 3y ago> https://www.etias.ca/ https://www.etias.ca/ > Details are automatically screened against a series of security databases. Remind me of those blacklists that airlines and banks have, which you can end up in one for a comment in social media..
- gerjomarty 3y agoAs an adjunct to this, the UK, which might have joined this scheme if it was still part of the EU, is now developing its own system called the ETA (Electronic Travel Authorisation) [1]. It'll cost £10 for two years. Currently only in use for a couple of middle eastern countries, but will be rolled out more widely in the future. [1]: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/electronic-travel-authorisation-eta https://www.gov.uk/guidance/electronic-travel-authorisation-...
- ozyschmozy 3y agoMaybe I'm just blind, but I wasn't able to find what ETIAS stands for anywhere on this website dedicated to ETIAS (including under "What is ETIAS"). For anyone else wondering, it's "European Travel Information and Authorisation System" This also makes me wonder (and doesn't seem to discuss anywhere) about "special" Turkish passports (green passports that government workers and their families can get that allow visa free travel to many countries including the EU). It's unclear to me if they would need ETIAS as well. And I imagine there's oodles of other edge cases like that where people will be confused and stuck at borders
- chfritz 3y ago"Starting in mid-2025"