Customs and Immigration in Europe (and C+I where it is not published - how?)

arj1 wrote:

How do they do it?

“They” apparently don’t spend as much time on EuroGA as we do, but just go out and fly

I don’t think so, so visibly and so close to Paris. My money would be on

• a phone call, in perfect French, to the police chief running LFPN, and a bottle of nice wine and you’d need good local connections

• an undocumented arrangement with the LFPN police, for a few hundred € ++ (check the aircraft type!) – I personally knew a bizjet pilot who was doing Biggin → Toussus after C+I were withdrawn there; I asked him and while he didn’t know specifics of who was paying who and how much, he showed the universal “cash” sign (rubbing two fingers) and I don’t think this was a cash bribe because the recipient eventually gets busted because too many people will know

I don’t think you can “just do it”. There is plenty you can “just do” as both Dan and myself very well know but landing in the country whose C+I regs you are violating (and presumably not getting out of there 5 mins later) is not reliably one of them, especially so close to Paris. You can do it, and I have done it, in the provinces, but I had a French speaker with me who made a phone call (gosh I’ve just given away that it was done in France )

Cash bribes are normally handled by the handling agent, which collects an extra “fee” and passes a % to the airport manager. That is the way at a certain Greek airport. But does LFPN have a handler? I reckon it is an undocumented police procedure for a few hundred € or maybe even 1k. Le Bourget would cost well over 1k for this type.

Dan wrote:

arj1 wrote: How do they do it?

“They” apparently don’t spend as much time on EuroGA as we do, but just go out and fly

:) But how do they arrange the C&I? Interesting…

I don’t think this requires any bribes or similar. I think you can arrange immigration about anywhere if you plan enough in advance and are willing to pay. German police will then travel and charge you the expenses, it all official. Years ago I was offered this at an airport for 200-300 Euro but then flew somewhere else. The big advantage if you choose an official small border corssing point at an airport is that actually in many cases German police will do about the same, drive there etc. But once it is a border crossing point the expenses are on the state and police charges you nothing.

Then, why not publish it?

A few hundred € for turning up, extracted from the “filthy rich” … a nice play on social stereotypes What is not to like?

On the other hand it could just have been Elizabeth Borne making her way back from her meeting with Leo Varadker🙂

That plane is busy !

How immigration works

I vowed 2024 would be the year I truly aired my CBIR and did some proper cross border flying. However much I look I can’t seem to find a good summery how immigration/customs really work and what is required when flying to different countries.

I have googled and searched the forums, but no joy.

What are the requirements for flying to other EU countries like Germany & France? Is an approved flightplan enough?
How about Norway and Switzerland? I’m Swedish with a EASA PPL.
I know the UK is its own thing with GAR and such.

Any reply is appreciated!

Firstly, did you type
immigration
into the Search box?

result

Let‘s start with this map here.

As long as you remain within the dark blue zone, you can roam absolutely freely, with needing customs or immigration formalities, and without being constrained to using particularly qualified airfields, on both ends of the flight. File a flightplan and go. It‘s fantastic.

The only exception to this is
a) Greece, which insists on am „international“ airport on their side for all international flights
b) in some cases, French airports insist on prior notice for international flights, even if within the dark blue area

(In 4 days time, Romania and Bulgaria will also belong to the dark blue group, making that area even bigger.)

I‘ll leave the other cases (where formalities are required) to others.