Stay informed with free updates
Simply sign up Travel and leisure industry myFT Digest – delivered straight to your inbox.
The price of travel permits needed by EU and US citizens to enter the UK will rise from £10 to £16, the government said, sparking warnings that the cost would hurt tourism.
Since the Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) system. It came into effect this monthMany visitors to the UK who do not require a visa must apply for digital permission to travel to the country.
Visitors currently pay £10 for a pass that is valid for two years and allows them to make multiple trips.
But the Home Office said the cost of the permit would rise from £10 to £16 to help “reduce the reliance of the immigration and border system on taxpayer funding”. The department has not set a date for the changes, which it said would raise an extra £269 million a year.
Tourist groups and Airlines She criticized the changes, saying they made the cost of visiting the UK increasingly uncompetitive in light of EU plans to charge all visitors who do not require a visa a €7 fee for a planned travel authorization scheme.
Richard Toomer, executive director of the Tourism Alliance trade association, said the decision to raise fees was “astonishing”.
“This is a particularly hard blow for our European visitors, who for the first time ever are being asked to apply for advance authorization to travel to the UK,” he said.
Tourism is worth 74 billion pounds annually to the United Kingdom, and last November ministers announced a goal to increase visitor numbers by about a third to 50 million people annually by 2030.
But Tomer said the goal will not be achieved “if the government continues to view tourists as just a cash cow.”
Tim Alderslade, chief executive of trade group British Airways, said the changes were “deeply disappointing”, but he welcomed the Home Office's decision to exempt transit passengers who visit UK airports but do not enter the country.
Heathrow Airport had warned that its position as a major central airport in Europe was threatened by the decision to impose fees on passenger transportation.
Visitors from more than 50 countries including the US, Australia and Canada have needed to apply for one of the UK entry permits from the start of the scheme, which is loosely modeled on the US Esta programme.
The list will be expanded to include EU citizens on April 2, although Irish citizens will be exempt.
EU and UK citizens have been caught up in increased border measures since frictionless travel disappeared with the implementation of the Brexit deal at the end of 2020, four years after the referendum.
Visitors are already facing stringent passport checks at the UK and EU borders, causing bouts of disruption at Eurostar and Channel ports.
UK citizens will also be locked into new EU biometric border checks, which are due to be implemented later this year but have been repeatedly postponed. A separate EU visa exemption programme, similar to the UK's ETA programme, is also scheduled to launch in 2025.
As UK immigration prices rise, the cost of other services including naturalization as a British citizen will also rise.
