A visa change that will land visitors to the EU with a small charge has been officially delayed.
Brits and other travellers from non-EU countries were set to be charged €7 (£5.92) for a visa-waiver form ahead of entry to member countries from next year.
However, it has now been announced that British travellers are unlikely to face the charge to enter the passport-free zone until 2024 at the earliest.
The European travel information and authorisation system ( ETIAS ) is applied to non-EU citizens from around 60 countries that have visa-free travel within the EU.
The system is now scheduled to open from November 2023.
ETIAS, which is similar to the US ESTA scheme, will require non-EU tourists to fill in a form and pay £5.93 before entering the passport-free zone in Europe..
Everyone aged from 18 to 70 will need to pay the fee to holiday in countries like France, Germany and Italy, but each application will last for three years.
It’s believed that approval on the scheme should take just a few minutes in most cases.
The system was originally expected to start at the end of 2022, but was delayed until May 2023.
Now, this has been postponed by another six months, the website SchengenVisaInfo.com first reported.
No reason for the delay has yet been provided.
An ETIAS form will be required to enter all countries in the EU passport-free zone – even non EU countries like Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia.
Besart Bajrami, founder of SchengenVisaInfo.com, said: “Having an ETIAS means that Britons will be able to skip some of the checks they undergo now, as all their information will be available in their ETIAS.
"Border guards won’t even have to ask the questions that they ask now.”
Post-Brexit rules have been causing issues for some British people this year.
Many people have found themselves unable to travel to EU member countries because of new rules which include your passport needing to be issued within 10 years of travel, and also having three months left following your holiday.
Meanwhile Brits living in Portugal have been denied entry to certain countries due to confusion over identity cards.
