Starting in 2024, Canadian passport holders will be required to apply online and pay a fee if they plan to stay short term in 30 European countries.
Starting in 2024, Canadian passport holders will be required to apply online and pay a fee if they plan to stay short term in 30 European countries.
Ya, just something to remember before you go!
In the grand scheme of things, pretty small compared to the cost/time of booking a flight and accommodation, but I’m sure some people will probably still forget/miss it.
I’ve found that actual details on travel required documents can be pretty hard to find. I traveled to Asia last year and the country I was visiting also needed a permit and vaccination stuff. Government webpage no details on the main page, airline had nada (and yes, I checked). I didn’t even know about it until I stopped by the airport while dropping somebody else off (same day) and the clerk asked about it. When I googled the exact permit name a government page did come up but I have no fucking clue how you’d even get to that page otherwise if you didn’t know what it was called.
Thankfully I was able to take a picture with my phone, submit my OTHER documentation with it online, and got the permit within a few hours in time for my flight.
Yeah, it’s gonna really suck for some people who forget to do this well ahead of time. They’ll have to cancel vacations or the likes. Most trips, you currently just bring your passport with you and that’s really it. Nothing to apply to ahead of time.
Hopefully it’s something that airlines will make part of purchasing tickets, so that you can’t forget it. But it seems like this means you basically can’t do last minute trips anymore. If you possibly could have a need to travel to the EU on short notice (eg, you have family there), you probably need to just keep this permit valid all the time. It would really suck to not be able to visit a dying family member because the permit could take weeks.
Th permit process is expected to take on order of hours for most people, and are valid for something like 3 years, unlimited entries.
The US has required the same of Europeans for quite some time now (ESTA waiver).
Edit: looks like they anticipate 95% of cases to be decided in minutes and the rest in not more than 4 days.
The part of the post that stood out to me was this quote:
Even if most people can do it in hours (not sure how much most is – 99.9%? 60%?), that still reads to me like it makes it a case where you can’t count on it for last minute trips or if you forget to do it.
It’s 95% within minutes. You could probably take an educated guess as to what the 5% will comprise in terms of nationalities that have visa free access to Europe and will not get approval in minutes.
You shouldn’t count on it for last minute trips, but I would suggest that it would be incredibly rare for someone who doesn’t have an established presence/relationship with europe to go last minute. If you do have an established professional or personal relationship that may require a last minute flight booking, pay the 7€ and have an approval on standby for 3 years.
The US requires the same from Europeans via ESTA and Canada requires the same from Europeans via eTA. This is Europe responding in kind to the same burden placed on their citizens.