Jun 4, 2020, 5:57 am
Last edit by: NewbieRunner
Mod note on thread engagement:
A reminder that this thread is about the self-isolation requirements for UK arrivals.
It is a help/Information resource for those travelling or returning to England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland from outside the UK. Let's concentrate on news, questions and answers that are relevant and on-topic and stay away from speculations about the spread of the virus, the performance of politicians and other topics which are more suitable for OMNI.
Please stay within these requirements to avoid issues.
A reminder that this thread is about the self-isolation requirements for UK arrivals.
It is a help/Information resource for those travelling or returning to England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland from outside the UK. Let's concentrate on news, questions and answers that are relevant and on-topic and stay away from speculations about the spread of the virus, the performance of politicians and other topics which are more suitable for OMNI.
Please stay within these requirements to avoid issues.
LATEST UPDATES
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/travel-t...virus-covid-19
18 March travel to the UK changes
If you will arrive in the UK from abroad after 4am, Friday 18 March, you do not need to:
- take any COVID-19 tests – before you travel or after you arrive
- fill in a UK passenger locator form before you travel
This will apply whether you are vaccinated or not.
You also will not need to quarantine when you arrive, in line with current rules.
Other countries still have COVID-19 entry rules in place. You should check travel advice before you travel.
If you will arrive in England before 4am, 18 March, you must follow the current rules as set out in this guidance.
*****
The following historical information is retained for the time being.
The Passenger Locator Form for passengers arriving into the UK can be found here:
https://visas-immigration.service.go...r-locator-form
This can only be completed once you are within 48 hours of arrival in the UK.
Exemption list from quarantine requirements - specific details:
https://www.gov.uk/government/public...k-border-rules
England
Statutory instrument for individual passengers arriving in to England: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2021/582/contents (this html version is updated, but may not have the very latest updates for Statutory Instruments released in the last few days)
Test to release for England only from 15 December, see post 4776 https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/32841066-post4776.html
Statutory instrument for transport providers http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2.../contents/made
Scotland
Statutory instrument for individual passengers arriving in to Scotland: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2020/169/contents (this html version is updated)
Wales
Statutory instrument for individual passengers arriving in to Wales: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/wsi/2020/574/contents (this html version is updated) &
Welsh language version: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/wsi/2...0200574_we.pdf
Northern Ireland
Statutory instrument https://www.legislation.gov.uk/nisr/2021/99/contents (this html version is updated)
PRACTICAL GUIDANCE FOR QUICK RELEASE FROM SELF-ISOLATION (based on November 28th updates)
[This section has been moved lower down in the wiki post following the change in self-isolation rule on 7th January 2022[
Any PCR test noted as a UK Government Day 2 test will be accepted for release from self isolation as soon as you get the negative result. If it is any other PCR test (eg "Fit to Fly") and not advertised specifically as a Day 2 test then it won't be valid.
This means that you can:[list]
- Book a suitable Day 2 PCR test before you travel and use the booking reference for the test on the PLF (Passenger Locator Form).
- On your day of arrival go to your scheduled test.
- Proceed to you place of self-isolation and await the result, which will hopefully be same / next day.
Alternatively:- Book any Day 2 PCR test before you travel even if you do not intend to use this test, and use the booking reference for the test on the PLF to ensure entry to the UK.
- Note that you are not strictly required to have a PCR booking before arrival, but your carrier might not know that so you run the risk of being denied boarding
- On your day of arrival (or before end of Day 2) go to a walk-in test centre and take a different test to the one you booked.
- Proceed to you place of self-isolation and await the result, which will hopefully be same / next day.
If you are leaving the UK before the end of day 2 then you do not need to take a test, but are required to self-isolate for the duration of your trip (since you do not have a negative result). Also, if you are self-isolating while waiting for a result (and hence have not been informed of a positive result and need to isolate) you may travel to leave the country.
If you take a test and it is positive for any variant of COVID you will be required to isolate for 10 days from the date of the test.
Whether you take a test or not you may be contacted by the UK Test and Trace system at any time if it becomes apparent that you have been in contact with another case. This is very unlikely to happen before day 3 if it is in relation to your flight to UK. Depending on the suspected / identified variant for that case and if you are fully-vaccinated by an accepted programme (see below for links to what this means and valid exemptions) :- Omnicron or not fully-vaccinated: You will be required to isolated for 10 days, including a bar on travel to leave the country. A negative Day 2 test does not release you from this requirement.
- Other and fully vaccinated : You will not be required to isolate.
- Book any Day 2 PCR test before you travel even if you do not intend to use this test, and use the booking reference for the test on the PLF to ensure entry to the UK.
- Proceed to you place of self-isolation and await the result, which will hopefully be same / next day.
- On your day of arrival go to your scheduled test.
Test Providers for Day 2/8 tests & Day 5 Test to release
This section is for FTers to post their experience with specific providers (good or bad). Keep it brief and to the point. Please mention how the service is provided and your FT name.
DNA Workplace - Postal - Test kits arrived with me on time. Royal Mail slow for return. 5+ days for Day 2 result. #DaveS
DNA Workplace - Postal - Test kits both arrived on time, video of tests required, results by late evening Day 3 and Day 9. #TSE
ExpressTest Gatwick - Drive through - Tested early at 1000 a few times for TTR. Results came through in evening. #DaveS
NowTest - Postal - Day 2 kit arrived on time, day 8 did not. Will update with result arrival times when applicable. #wilsnunn
Collinson - Postal - Day 5 Test to Release kit arrived in time. Results and release by end of day 6. #tjcxx
CTM - Postal - Days 2/8 kits arrived together in time. Both sent results 2 days after posting. #tjcxx
Qured (Oncologica) - Postal -Day 2/8 kits arrived late. Results 3+ days from posting. #Gagravarr
Qured (Oncologica) - Postal - Day 2/8 kits arrived on time. Day 2 result on Day 5 and Day 8 result on Day 10 - happy customer! #EddLegll
Qured (Ocnologica) - Postal - Day 2/8 kits arrived on time. Day 2 result on Day 5 (after bedtime; ironically after my TTR result). #KSVVZ2015
Anglia DNA - Postal - Day 2/8 kits arrived early. (Both were labelled Day2). Results on Day 4 and Day 9. Cheapest on the list at the time, and good service/result. #tjcxx
Qured - Pre-flight test booked and bought through BA. Very efficient service. Highly recommended. #lhrsfo
Randox - Days 2 and 8. Booked two days before return, using BA discount. Kits already arrived on return. Slightly confusing instructions but manageable. Used Randox dropbox and results next day. Good. #lhrsfo
Randox - Day 2 (also used as pre departure test for a London to Milan flight). Used a drop box and results arrived at midnight the next day. #11101
Randox - Day 2 test centre - 2h30 queues outside the test centre in Waterloo. Results of antigen arrived 45 minutes later. #11101
Collinson - Test to Release at LHR T2. Good trip out! Very efficient service and well organised. Used BA discount. Results by end of day. Excellent. #lhrsfo
DAM - Test to Release in Fulham (they have many locations) - the cheapest fast turnaround TTR we have found. They promise 24 hours but in reality me, my wife, and my son (on different days) have received results inside of 12 hours. Very efficient staff as well. Princes outside of Central London as low as 99 GBP. Fulham is 129 GBP. #KSVVZ2015
Boots/Source Bioscience - days 2&8. Both packs sent in the same mail, waiting at the isolation address. Dropped off at postbox at 4pm, result back next day between 4 and 5 pm, very effective. Bought from Boots, £160, but same package sold directly bu Source Bioscience is just £120. Aaargh! Instructions said nasal and throat swabs, did only nasal and marked accordingly, no issues. #WilcoRoger
Collinsons/Stansted walkin TTR - test taken 1:30 pm, email with results 10:10 pm same day If the BA20OFF doesn't work (didn't work for us) there's another discount on the airport's site #WilcoRoger
Ordered Day-2 kit from Chronomics a week before our return for £18.99. Duly dispatched day we were returning to UK, so arrived on day following return. Reasonably simple process to do test and upload -ve result picture. Not sure where +ve result would have led to... #EsherFlyer
Hale Clinic testing centre (near Oxford Circus) - While not the least expensive, appoint schedules are accurate and results returned in promised timeframe. I've used the clinic for Day 2 tests (twice) and antigen test for US (once). I would def utilize again. #ecaarch
Halo at T5 (Sofitel) - Day 2 PCR spit test. Took the test 7pm, results arrived 7am the next day. No queues but a slightly awkward process to follow.
Useful data sources:
New cases per 100k - 7 days: https://covid19.who.int/table
New tests per 1000 - 7 days: https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-testing
Vaccination doses per 100: https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations
Sequenced samples uploaded to GISAID: https://www.gisaid.org/index.php?id=208
NHS Track & Trace data (positivity rates for arriving passengers are published every three weeks, so if you can't find the data in the current release it will be in one of the previous two) https://www.gov.uk/government/collec...weekly-reports https://assets.publishing.service.go...ut_week_50.ods
UK daily COVID data https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/?_ga...827.1594116739
Risk assessment methodology to inform international travel traffic light system
Data informing international travel traffic-light risk assessments
Testing Terminology
Notes which may assist with understanding which tests to use and with "reuse" of UK tests for other countries regulations:
- LFT: Lateral Flow Test - A rapid antigen test using nasal / throat swab typically performed by the traveler at home, hotel, etc using simple disposable device. Usually tests the "outer shell" of the nucleus (which causes the symptoms and is reasonably stable across variants) and not the "spikes" (which allow new variants to invade more easily), so gives a positive result for many variants. (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-...d_antigen_test)
- PCR: Polymerase Chain Reaction - A laboratory based test which looks at the nucleus of the virus to determine which specific variant it is. After a positive LFT test ("I have some form of COVID") a PCR test ("You have the Gamma variant") allows identification and tracking of new variants to see if they are likely to become a "variant of concern". (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymerase_chain_reaction)
- NAAT: Nucleic Acid Amplification Test - A general class of laboratory based tests which includes PCR, LAMP, etc tests. (See https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019...b/naats.html)
UK arrivals - pre-departure, quarantine and post-arrival [currently no requirements]
May 8, 2021, 10:42 am
#7591
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Wesley Chapel, FL
Programs: American Airlines
Posts: 30,033
I had no idea. Wow. No wonder nothing is changing. I think if a similar poll was taken in the US it would be probably 10%. Must just be a big cultural shift or the majority of people just think in a vacuum.
May 8, 2021, 10:43 am
#7592
Moderator, Iberia Airlines, Airport Lounges, and Ambassador, British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Feb 2010
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold; Flying Blue Life Platinum; LH Sen.; Hilton Diamond; Kemal Kebabs Prized Customer
Posts: 63,830
Interesting - it'd be brilliant to have a more complete table, with more countries, and the thresholds for each metric (or, if these don't exist and it's more a play-by-ear kind of thing, what sort of brackets they ought to be aiming for). It could replace your famous table on this thread!
May 8, 2021, 10:46 am
#7593
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: UK
Programs: BA Silver
Posts: 1,137
I've become very confused by all the, changing, rules - can I travel from England to Scotland and then return a week or so later?
May 8, 2021, 10:46 am
#7594
Ambassador, British Airways; FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Leeds, UK
Programs: BA GGL/CCR, GfL, HH Diamond
Posts: 42,978
May 8, 2021, 10:55 am
#7595
Suspended
Join Date: Aug 2020
Posts: 963
May 8, 2021, 11:04 am
#7596
Community Director
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Norwich, UK
Programs: A3*G, BA Gold, BD Gold (in memoriam), IHG Diamond Ambassador
Posts: 8,478
May 8, 2021, 11:15 am
#7597
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2014
Programs: Top Tier with all 3 alliances
Posts: 11,669
Are we going to start seeing some booking cancellations and some saver award availability opening up....
May 8, 2021, 11:17 am
#7598
Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 7,237
Yes, it would allow us to be more effective at guessing who will go Green next. As things stand it's Malta and the Nordics. But my table takes me a few minutes, the remaining data is trickier to obtain in some cases. I'll think about how it can be done, it may need more than one of us to do it.......
Last edited by 13901; May 8, 2021 at 12:18 pm
May 8, 2021, 11:44 am
#7599
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 1,754
Scientists mean well but they operate in a vacuum where the non-scientific impacts don’t factor. There have already been multiple studies by qualified outlets that indicate the transmission risk from the vaccinated is essentially nil. It seems the UK scientists have not yet reached that conclusion. Other countries have accepted this conclusion or it seems doubtful they would be moving forward with known plans to accept vaccinated tourists.
Job losses, economic ruin and mental health issues are not in their calculus. As long as they are the predominant voice, this will never end.
Job losses, economic ruin and mental health issues are not in their calculus. As long as they are the predominant voice, this will never end.
- Vaccine effect on transmission In households where the index case was not vaccinated before testing positive, there were 96,898 secondary cases out of 960,765 household contacts (10.1%).
- There were 196 secondary cases in 3,424 contacts (5.72%) where the index case received the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine 21 days or more before testing positive,
- and 371 secondary cases in 5,939 contacts (6.25%) where the index case received the BNT162b2 vaccine 21 days or more before testing positive.
https://khub.net/documents/135939561...=1619601878136
Overall vaccines are incredibly effective (see link below for more studies) though not 100% - it's a question of how many deaths a country accepts along the way to everyone getting vaccinated and how much each country is willing to invest to find and mitigate infection chains (e.g. other countries have built testing infrastructure in airports to test all passengers, the UK Government prefers to discourage travel).
https://www.gov.uk/government/public...19-vaccination
Last edited by 8420PR; May 8, 2021 at 11:50 am
May 8, 2021, 11:49 am
#7600
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Wesley Chapel, FL
Programs: American Airlines
Posts: 30,033
May 8, 2021, 11:54 am
#7601
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: London & Sonoma CA
Programs: UA 1K, MM *G for life, BAEC Gold
Posts: 10,227
This Schengen / USA thing is very interesting and something I've been pondering. When, shortly, Schengen opens up to intra-Schengen travel, then either the UK will have to have the same rules for all of Schengen, or trust people arriving at the border to say where they have been. The same, logically, should happen with respect to the USA. If you've been to California, that's fine, but not if you've been to Michigan. From a bureaucrat's point of view, both are identical circumstances. Indeed, from the point of view of some French, for example, it's easier to go to BRU by train than LHR for their hop over the Channel.
So the other way of looking at it is through risk, which HMG purports to do. But, if you are looking at risk, you need to assess who is being vaccinated and who is not. In Europe, most aren't vaccinated and vaccinations are not freely available - that may change by summer but it won't withing the next couple of months. In the USA, everyone who wants to be vaccinated can be - they are freely available to all (and, mostly, are the best ones). So, if you look at the subset of Europeans travelling to the UK vs the subset of Americans travelling to the UK, are they likely to be vaccinated or not? I can't speak for Europeans (although only one of my friends there has yet been fully vaccinated), but I can confidently say that everyone I know in the US who is even remotely likely to leave their borders has been vaccinated. I don't know how you quantify those risks, but it seems clear to me that the risks of opening to the USA are much lower than Portugal when Portugal has open borders with Schengen.
Which leads me to believe that the decision is political: HMG doesn't want to allow Americans easy access here as he will lose his only lever to make Biden see sense, a necessity for our economy.
So the other way of looking at it is through risk, which HMG purports to do. But, if you are looking at risk, you need to assess who is being vaccinated and who is not. In Europe, most aren't vaccinated and vaccinations are not freely available - that may change by summer but it won't withing the next couple of months. In the USA, everyone who wants to be vaccinated can be - they are freely available to all (and, mostly, are the best ones). So, if you look at the subset of Europeans travelling to the UK vs the subset of Americans travelling to the UK, are they likely to be vaccinated or not? I can't speak for Europeans (although only one of my friends there has yet been fully vaccinated), but I can confidently say that everyone I know in the US who is even remotely likely to leave their borders has been vaccinated. I don't know how you quantify those risks, but it seems clear to me that the risks of opening to the USA are much lower than Portugal when Portugal has open borders with Schengen.
Which leads me to believe that the decision is political: HMG doesn't want to allow Americans easy access here as he will lose his only lever to make Biden see sense, a necessity for our economy.
May 8, 2021, 12:03 pm
#7602
Suspended
Join Date: Feb 2009
Programs: DL, UA, AA, VS
Posts: 5,226
If Portugal really is allowing a lot of travel from South America, which is currently one of the hotspots for high number of new cases, then maybe UK will regret putting it in the green list.
May 8, 2021, 12:08 pm
#7603
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: Kent, UK
Programs: M&S Elite+
Posts: 3,658
Yes, it would allow us to be more effective at guessing who will go Green next. As things stand it's Malta and the Nordics. But my table takes me a few minutes, the remaining data is trickier to obtain in some cases. I'll think about how it can be done, it may need more than one of us to do it.......
May 8, 2021, 12:35 pm
#7604
Moderator, Iberia Airlines, Airport Lounges, and Ambassador, British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Feb 2010
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold; Flying Blue Life Platinum; LH Sen.; Hilton Diamond; Kemal Kebabs Prized Customer
Posts: 63,830
It doesn't, they slammed the brakes on against Brazil travel some time ago. The main variant shown in Portugal, given they sequence a fair bit, is good old B.1.1.7, otherwise known as the Kent variant. And their infection curve almost exactly mirrored the UK's escape from that variant too.
May 8, 2021, 12:50 pm
#7605
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Earth
Posts: 912
I think the green country list is far to restricted, but also think we have to stay fact based:
https://khub.net/documents/135939561...=1619601878136
Overall vaccines are incredibly effective (see link below for more studies) though not 100% - it's a question of how many deaths a country accepts along the way to everyone getting vaccinated and how much each country is willing to invest to find and mitigate infection chains (e.g. other countries have built testing infrastructure in airports to test all passengers, the UK Government prefers to discourage travel).
https://www.gov.uk/government/public...19-vaccination
https://khub.net/documents/135939561...=1619601878136
Overall vaccines are incredibly effective (see link below for more studies) though not 100% - it's a question of how many deaths a country accepts along the way to everyone getting vaccinated and how much each country is willing to invest to find and mitigate infection chains (e.g. other countries have built testing infrastructure in airports to test all passengers, the UK Government prefers to discourage travel).
https://www.gov.uk/government/public...19-vaccination
A 1 in 10 chance at worst of transmission? With the vulnerable already vaccinated? Hardly seems worthy of making it a crime to leave the country.