I knew the EU were bringing in ETIAS, but I’d completely missed that the UK was bringing in a similar system soon. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/electron…horisation-eta
From Link
Who will need an ETA
From 15 November 2023, you’ll need an ETA if you’re travelling to the UK and you’re a national of Qatar . You’ll be able to apply from 25 October.
From 22 February 2024, you’ll need an ETA if you’re travelling to the UK and you’re a national of:
Bahrain
Jordan
Kuwait
Oman
Saudi Arabia
United Arab Emirates
More nationalities will be added to the scheme later.
Who will not need an ETA
You will not need an ETA if you have either:
a British or Irish passport
permission to live, work or study in the UK
a visa to enter the UK
Who wants to go to the UK anyway !!
Especially now you can no longer claim VAT back
Say whut?
It will eventually apply to all countries that don't require a visa including EU nations.
If that’s true, they should tell them to update the UKGov website accordingly. Apparently tax free shopping is still as it was.
I am pretty sure any statement you make has only around a 30% chance of being true or accurate. You seem to make things up at random. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/claim-va…eland#section2
That was due to be reversed in the ill-fated Truss budget. Did the Sunak government reverse the reversal?
To be fair to Biro what is written on the website is not clear. For visitors to Great Britain „it is available for in Great Britain (England, Wales and Scotland) if they’re delivered straight to an address outside the UK“. If I were to read that literally it means that buying products and then getting a refund at the airport is no longer possible. Looking at the link from Bicester this appears to be the case https://www.thebicestercollection.co…ional-shipping
This certainly isn‘t how it used to be and only a few of the stores there are participating.
Chuff your link is specific for Northern Ireland, that well known shopping Mecca technically you‘re not wrong, but…
Not quite. You used to be able to buy things in shops and receive a paper to claim the tax back when exporting them out if the UK. I’ve bought stuff at M&S in the past and claimed the tax back at Manchester airport as I departed the UK to fly home.
Now it seems that the tax free option is only available for goods shipped directly out of the country with the exception of Northern Ireland.
However Marks & Sparks, on their wonderful Swiss web-site, takes the full UK retail price (including vat), converts it to francs at the selling rate and adds Swiss VAT. So you’d be paying Swiss vat on top of UK vat which M&S has put into their pocket.
Indeed hence why I would stock up on underwear whilst in the UK but that’s a whole other issue.
So my Swiss spouse of 40 years will need to pay £10.00 for 2 years to visit the country she lived in for 10 years!?!
I have UK and Swiss citizenships and passports...
Yep!
Correct. And your UK friends and family will have to pay something for the Schengen equivalent to visit CH. That is if the techno-wienies ever figure out how to do it.
As in never because there will be no checking in Ireland unless someone is stupid enough risk violence breaking out again by trying checking Unionist passports when they want to go to "Mainland Britain" as the call it.
It isn’t EU nations, it’s Schengen nations.
I’m in excellent company Chuff…
Look carefully…
From: [HM Revenue & Customs](https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/hm-revenue-customs) Published31 December 2020Last updated 20 August 2021
As of 1 January 2021 the UK no longer operates Tax Free Shopping. Since 1 January 2021, visitors are no longer be able to purchase items in store in Great Britain under the VAT Retail Export Scheme. For goods purchased before this date, you can still make a claim under the scheme on departure from the UK or EU .
This must be one of the 30% posts i guess, Chuffy Chapo
I’ve just run ‘Switzerland’ and ‘visiting family’ through the UK gov site and NO, your spouse won’t need an eta as long as her visit’s for less than 6 months.
Is this one of the 30% that you get right?
I seldom claimed back the VAT from UK anyway. Not worth the bother, especially with Global Blue.
Why would anyone go to the UK? To sample (but not bring home, obviously) the great range of British cheeses available. To stock up on marmite and custard powder. To drink properly cool beer (as in temperature), to tour the whiskey distilleries in Scotland...