Transit without visa
 

I am an Indian passport holder with a US visa & am looking for information on whether I would be able to transit through the UK without a visa.

Little bit of background on my situation. I had a 10 year UK visa that expired recently. I applied for a new visa about 3 months ago but due to the backlog the UK Embassy is currently facing in India at the moment, my visa has still not come through. I leave for the US in 3 days so there is little to no chance now that I will get my visa in time.

My original plan was to travel DEL-JFK on the 1st of August, JFK-LHR on the 7th of August, stay a couple of days in London, then fly LHR-CDG on the 10th & finally CDG-DEL on the 13th. Now that my UK visa has not come through in time, one option is to change my LHR-CDG flight so that I leave on the same day as I arrive in the UK. However, since I am on separate tickets, I will still require to go through immigration so that I can collect my bags & check them in for my next flight.

I read somewhere that if I have a US visa then entry to the UK is allowed for a 48 hour period & is based on officer discretion at immigration. Not sure if that is accurate or not so am looking for anyone who has experience in a similar situation.

You need to apply for a visitor in transit visa:

https://www.gov.uk/transit-visa

Which is not possible to get before I leave since the transit visa takes 6-8 weeks. In any case my regular visa will come before that. Just not in time for my trip.

Also, the same website has the following information as well:

I think you meet the rules you quoted, but the problem is convincing the airline to let you board in the US.

You will be fine. US and UK airlines are well aware of the TWOV rules and you are eligible to transit the UK on the basis of your US visa.

You can check for yourself
https://www.gov.uk/check-uk-visa/

trying to assess your situation, Indian passport, in transit airside, destination somewhere other than the UK or Ireland
I think you land at this page
https://www.gov.uk/check-uk-visa/y/i...ewhere_else/no
Which has the following exemption for requiring a visa

Thanks for the confirmation.

I suspect your biggest problem will be at check-in in India. Have some documents ready to prove the exemption. Good luck and do let us know how it goes.

Check-in in DEL won't be a problem since I'm traveling on a separate ticket to the US. They won't need to see the return ticket.

The separate ticket is the issue. Maybe this does not apply in India, but in other countries they would consider your final destination as the UK since that is what it says on your ticket. They would then expect you to satisfy the entry requirements for the UK.

I have a separate DL ticket for DEL-AMS-JFK. The next 2 segments are award tickets booked via BA for JFK-LHR & LHR-CDG. Finally the last flight is a DL ticket from CDG-DEL.

So all they will see in India is the one way DEL-AMS-JFK ticket since the others are all on separate PNRs.

Whilst I misread your routing, the same comment applies but at check in at JFK.

So the check in agents for each of the three sectors for your return journey will really only be looking as far as your immediate destination to assess whether you have the right to enter that country. In case you are not aware although your first two return sectors are on BA they have a policy not not permitting check through onto other flights, even their own. So the check in agent at JFK will want to know you have the right to enter the UK at LHR, and they will not usually consider your onward flight to CDG even if your retimed to be the same day as your arrive. Additionally, if have check in luggage then you need to assume you have to go airside at LHR.

If you therefore opted to shift the date of your LHR CDG sector you may still need to assert you can enter the UK as far as BA are concerned. Also be aware that flight availability out of LHR is very limited due to a number of operational issues with airline and airport resources, so changing the date of LHR CDG might be difficult.
Although it's a separate issue, you also need to assert your right to enter Schengen for your flight to CDG.

My previous answer using https://www.gov.uk/check-uk-visa/ assumed you could direct transit at LHR which now appears to be wrong.

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I'm aware of BA not permitting through check-in for their two flights which is an area I feel I will have a problem. But I do meet the requirements of the exemption of transiting without a visa & I'm pretty sure BA agents in JFK would be aware of this exemption.

I already have a LHR-CDG ticket that leaves 4 & a half hours after I land in LHR. I had booked this as a backup in case my visa did not come through in time. Unfortunately there is no availability on BA to get a through JFK-LHR-CDG ticket on my travel date. This would have taken care of any transit/visa/eligibility issues.

Why do you say that? I have a Schengen visa issued from France.

Why do you think your previous answer is wrong? Even if I have to transit landside, using https://www.gov.uk/check-uk-visa/ I arrive at https://www.gov.uk/check-uk-visa/y/i...where_else/yes which has the following exemption:

Apologies, I missed the 'may' out of my sentence. It should have read "You may need to apply for a visitor in transit visa"

Good luck with your travels!