Warning for British travellers to check passport as they could be banned from entering EU

This is very interesting and a note to all that you must make sure your passport is being stamped.

Brits have been warned they could be banned from European countries if they don’t check their passport when they leave.

Anyone that travels to the Schengen Area will need a stamp when entering or leaving the region after the UK left the EU at the start of last year.

Current rules state that people can remain within an EU country for a maximum of 90 days in a 180 day period.

However, if an immigration official does not bother to stamp a passport when leaving the country it could look like you had remained inside the country for the whole time when you came to return.

The Foreign Office has now moved to advise people of the risk. Its latest advice states: “Border guards will use passport stamps to check you’re complying with the 90-day visa-free limit for short stays in the Schengen area.

“If relevant entry or exit stamps are not in your passport, border guards will presume that you have overstayed your visa-free limit.”

It added: “You can show evidence of when and where you entered or exited the Schengen area, and ask the border guards to add this date and location in your passport. Examples of acceptable evidence include boarding passes and tickets.”

The advice follows after a British woman was refused entry to Spain from Gibraltar because she didn’t have an exit stamp from her previous trip.

She told thelocal.es: “The guards initially stamped my passport to enter, then they noticed I had no exit stamp from that one-week visit in June, thereby classing me as an overstayer and subsequently marked the entry stamp with the letter F and two lines.”

She said that she had proof that she had been in the UK but this was not accepted.

“Even though I have proof of returning to the UK via banking activity as well as the test and trace Covid app, the border guards would not accept or look at any proof nor let me speak to anyone that could help,” said the 72-year-old.

“My son, who speaks Spanish, tried to explain that I had other proof of returning to the UK but the guards would not accept or even consider looking at it.

“They just kept insisting that I had no stamp, that I had overstayed and would be arrested as illegal.”

Read on My London.