Ukkram

My non EU wife is to fly with me to the UK this Friday but she only has a PT residencia card and no visa.
I recently saw on BBC that the EU was discussing the closure of the Schengen cross border thing due to the Syrian saga.
What do you think her chances of boarding the carrier are? I have not read about the results of this discussion.

Pulaski

(i) The UK isn't in the Schengen area anyway.

(ii) Does your wife have a passport? Is the passport from a country who's citizens are allowed to visit the UK without a visa? If the answer is "yes" to both questions she shouldn't have a problem. If the answer is "no" to either question I wouldn't bet tuppence on her being allowed to fly to the UK.

EMR

When she lands in the UK she will have to fill in the non UK resident, non EU citizen cards and then present this at passport control.
I would check with your carrier and the UK embassy in Lisbon.

Ukkram

There is now way to contact EasyJet via email. Also, the UK embassy does not do inquiries to this. Home Affairs does it.

Pulaski

If I read your post #1 correctly, that she doesn't have a passport, I don't see how she is going to get into the UK.

EMR

You can contact easyjet by email ?
Uk embassys have visa sections , have you called them?

Ukkram

I did not say that she does not have a PP. She has no visa and only has a South African PP and a PT residencia card.

Ukkram

I am sure that you cannot give me links to them. I have checked and found nothing.

Sorry. Found one for Eastjet.
International flights within the EU
Valid passport or national identity card

EMR

She will still have to complete the non UK resident card on arrival having a SA passport.

Red Eric

The UK is not part of the Schengen area, so any rules and regs which apply or have changed are irrelevant as far as your trip is concerned.

Even if one has a residence permit from a Schengen area country, an entry visa is needed for a non EU spouse to travel to a non-Schengen country (unless one is the holder of a passport from a country whose citizens do not need a visa to visit).

Your wife would need an EEA family permit to be allowed in to the UK.

Ukkram

I was aware of the Macarthy Case but not sure if this has been tested yet. The rules were changed in April but I am worried that the airport staff may not know about it yet.

On 16 March 2015, the Immigration (European Economic Area) (Amendment) Regulation 2015 SI No 694 were laid before Parliament and will come into force on 6 April.

The effect of these amendments will be that, from 6 April 2015, EEA Family Permits will no longer be required in circumstances where a valid residence card issued under Article 10 of the Directive is held by a non-EEA national accompanying or joining an EEA national exercising free movement rights in the United Kingdom.

Ukkram

Just found this in the uk.gov website. Germany and Estonia were at that stage the only countries that had biometric Residency Cards that ruled out forgery.

SCHEDULE 1
Amendments to the 2006 Regulations
Regulation 2 (general interpretation)
1. In regulation 2(1)
(ii)in sub-paragraph (b), for “Germany and Estonia” substitute “any EEA State, except Switzerland”.

Red Eric

Then I stand corrected.

Have you seen this page yet, Ukkram? https://www.gov.uk/government/public...residence-card

Ukkram

Thanks Eric. Yes I did read it and I hope the staff at the airport did as well. Will see on Friday.

captainflack

Your wife does not need a EEA family permit as long as she has the PT residence card with 'family member of an EU national' or words to that effect on it. My wife is Brazilian, she has one with that. The UK only recognized German and Estonian residence cards, but this was ruled illegal.

https://blogs.kent.ac.uk/eu-rights-c...om-april-2015/

The EEA family permit is a farce, it is a UK invention to move the decision on entry offshore. Ignore that. Don't need it.

Here it is on the UK govt web site

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/entering-the-uk-as-the-holder-of-an-article-10-residence-card/entering-the-uk-as-the-holder-of-an-article-10-residence-card


Edit: The UK border staff are clowns, they almost certainly won't have got the memo, assuming there is one around who can actually read. My wife had previously overstayed in the UK over ten years ago, we came in last year on her PT residence card under freedom of movement rules, but the immigration staff weren't having any of it. Stupid guy kept telling me sarcastically, I was British, he'll use British rules, Britain is not in Schengen, blah blah blah. Eventually I got him so wound up, he refused to deal with me and got someone else. Eventually another guy overhead me keep insisting they call EU casework, and eventually I saw a lightbulb go off in his head that *maybe* he remembered something about this. He went off, made a call 'to check on my wife's immigration history', came back asked for wedding cert which we had, and promptly got monkey number one to put a nice big entry stamp in my wife's passport.

This was Luton, a major airport for EU flights, and the immigration staff whose job is to know the rules had no clue. I have a day job, and yet I know immigration rules better than them. This is a clue as to the training and general calibre of the bouncers... er, I mean border guards at UK airports.

Remember the magic words "call EU casework".