When a Holiday Giant Got Brexit Travel Advice Wrong: Setting the ETIAS Record Straight

Even Europe's biggest holiday company can get the rules wrong. In June 2024, TUI corrected the Brexit travel advice on its website after The Independent pointed out errors that risked confusing the very customers it was trying to reassure. The mistakes were not trivial: they touched on the new EU entry rules, the cost of future travel permits, and which countries actually sit inside the border-free Schengen Area.

The correction is a useful hook, because the same myths circulate widely. Here is the accurate picture as it stood in the summer of 2024.

Photo by Jeffry Surianto on Pexels

The ETIAS timing myth

TUI's website had claimed that the EU's ETIAS scheme had been "in operation since 2022". That was simply wrong. The pre-registration system would not begin until April 2025 at the earliest. The EU's plan was to introduce the Entry/Exit System (EES) first, in autumn 2024, with ETIAS following roughly six months later.

The two systems are distinct. EES is an automated border database that records non-EU visitors as they enter and leave. ETIAS, by contrast, is a pre-travel authorisation that visa-exempt visitors must obtain online before they set off, broadly modelled on the United States' ESTA. Conflating the two, or assuming either was already live, was a recipe for confusion.

What ETIAS would actually cost and cover

When it launches, ETIAS will ask visitors to register online and pay a small fee before travelling to the EU and wider Schengen area. The charge was set at €7 (about £6) for a permit valid for up to three years. The scheme has been in planning since 2016 — back when the UK, still an EU member, was involved in shaping it. Brussels describes ETIAS as a "simple, fast and visitor-friendly system" rather than a visa in the traditional sense.

For most holidaymakers, then, the future reality is modest: a one-off online form, a single payment, and a permit that lasts for years. It is the misinformation, not the system itself, that causes the most anxiety.

The Schengen reset that no longer exists

TUI also implied that Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania sat outside the Schengen Area, suggesting travellers could use them to "reset" their 90-day clock. That is no longer true. Croatia joined Schengen in 2023, while Bulgaria and Romania are now part of the border-free zone for arrivals by air and sea. The only EU nations still outside Schengen are Ireland and Cyprus.

Crucially, the 90-days-in-180 short-stay rule applies across the EU, the EEA and Switzerland as a single area. Hopping between member states does not buy extra time. For a fuller breakdown of how these systems connect, the ETIAS and EES overview sets out what visitors can expect before and after departure.

After The Independent flagged the errors, TUI corrected the information on its site. The lesson for travellers is simple: check the rules against a reliable source, and treat confident-sounding claims with healthy caution.

Photo by Mitsuo Komoriya on Unsplash