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The price of travel permits needed by EU and US citizens to enter the UK is to rise from £10 to £16, the government said, triggering warnings that the cost will damage tourism.
Since the electronic travel authorisation (ETA) scheme took effect this month, many visitors to the UK who do not require a visa have to apply for digital permission to travel to the country.
Visitors at present pay £10 for a permit that is valid for two years and allows them to take multiple journeys.
But the Home Office said the cost of a permit would rise from £10 to £16 in order to help “reduce the reliance of the migration and borders system on taxpayer funding”. The government department did not set a date for the changes, which it said would raise an additional £269mn a year.
Tourism groups and airlines criticised 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 need a visa €7 for its planned travel authorisation scheme.
Richard Toomer, executive director of the Tourism Alliance trade association, said the decision to raise the charge was “staggering”.
“This is especially a kick in the teeth for our European visitors just as they are required for the first time ever to apply for advance permission to travel to the UK,” he said.
Tourism is worth £74bn a year to the UK, and ministers in November announced a target to increase visitor numbers by nearly a third to 50mn people a year by 2030.
But Toomer said the target would be missed “if the government keeps viewing tourists simply as a cash cow”.
Tim Alderslade, chief executive of trade group Airlines UK, said the changes were “bitterly disappointing” but welcomed the Home Office’s decision to exempt transiting passengers who visit UK airports but do not enter the country.
Heathrow airport had warned that its position as Europe’s leading hub airport was threatened by the decision to charge transfer passengers.
Visitors from more than 50 countries including the US, Australia and Canada have needed to apply for one of the permits to enter the UK since the start of the scheme, which is loosely modelled on the US Esta programme.
The list will be expanded to include EU nationals on April 2, although Irish citizens will be exempt.
EU and UK citizens have been caught in increased border formalities since frictionless travel disappeared with the implementation of the Brexit deal at the end of 2020, four years after the referendum.
Visitors already face stringent passport checks at UK and EU borders, which have caused bouts of disruption for Eurostar and the Channel ports.
UK citizens will also be caught up in new EU biometric border checks, which are due to be rolled out later this year but have been repeatedly delayed. A separate EU visa waiver programme, similar to the UK ETA, is also due to be rolled out in 2025.
Under the UK’s immigration price rises, the cost of other services including naturalisation as a British citizen will also rise.