For help, advice and discussion about stuff not related to aviation. Play nice: no religion, no politics and no axe grinding please.
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#1885063
malcolmfrost wrote:International travel is optional, I don't think it should effectively be funded by the taxpayer...

Point of order to my learned friend, but that sort of thinking - all flying is bucket and spade flying - is exactly what gets GA runways closed. It was exactly the justification used to close the UKs only post-war commercial runway at Sheffield Airport - because people could use Doncaster instead.

eltonioni wrote:Out of interest, just what happens if you don't submit a test within 48 hours of return to the UK? Who is going to enforce it, how and under what laws? And what is the penalty for not bothering apart from very dirty looks from forumites?
keveng wrote:I would suggest it isn't enforceable , however remember when we could self isolate at home and idiots decided that is didn't apply to them , we got enforced holiday stays in hotels at our cost , so the suggestion would be play by the rules and everyone benefits.

This is what I suspect too. In many respects, it's encouraging that people are doing their bit without the need for legal compulsion. It's also a little bit alarming that a British Government can push around the populace so easily without scrutiny in the manner of a dictatorship.

@malcolmfrost of course I'll be doing my bit just like you would. :thumleft:
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#1885066
I would suggest that if this new variant somehow mutated with Ebola and as well as feeling poorly you shat your innards out, there would be no confusion, dodging tests and declining the vaccine or worrying about taking hols abroad !
Flyin'Dutch', JAFO liked this
#1885067
MikeB wrote:
Keveng wrote:Cant use the free ones for travel purposes , you have to have a paid for one , just one of the twisted rules imposed


2 points to make about this.

First: W hen you order a test you are given a reference which must be registered on a govt travel locator website. Then, you enter the results of that test on the same website, thus providing a straightforward mechanism for tracking any who haven't complied.

Second: Taxpayers money should not be used to subsidise testing for travel


Regarding your first point, Mike, that could just as easily be done with the free tests that have a unique identifier. Regarding your second point, if you think about the long term implications of covid, this testing is still something that benefits the population generally, and it is but a drop in the ocean of the cost of covid.

I'm personally of the view that the main intention is to act as a highly visible deliberate disincentive to travel.
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#1885075
Foo Gee wrote:For those of you who are currently abroad and not sure when these latest rules come in to force I can confirm (from my Passenger Locator Form) that they will be in place after 04.00 on Tuesday 30th November.

Why oh why couldn't that rather useful piece of information have been imparted during the announcement yesterday? I have trawled so many different sites trying to find the facts and it is only now when I am filling out my form that I have discovered when the new rules come into play.

So frustrating!

We have spent a couple of hours sorting stuff out after the changes: buying PCR tests to be delivered for when we get home; discovering where the nearest collection point is to home to avoid postal delays in getting the results; checking the locator form and airline check-in requirements etc. It is frustrating to be needing to do this stuff while on holiday, but I understand the need for it, and to be honest after a rather underwhelming year for a number of different reasons we both still feel that the need for a break in the Sun outweighs the niggling but not really too onerous bureaucracy involved. It might have been different in the days before decent WiFi and internet connections on holiday. :wink:

My advice for those dithering over whether or not the risks of changes to procedures whilst abroad and the frustration of requirements etc outweighs the need to travel is to just do it. At some point we need to push the re-start button; why not now?

Took LFT test before breakfast this morning and so far so good. :lol:

PW
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#1885084
Bill McCarthy wrote:I would suggest that if this new variant somehow mutated with Ebola and as well as feeling poorly you shat your innards out, there would be no confusion, dodging tests and declining the vaccine or worrying about taking hols abroad !


Just for Clarity im Going over to see my family for Christmas and my Dad who has had a quad heart bypass! for some of us this isn't a holiday.
#1885085
Flyin'Dutch' wrote:
malcolmfrost wrote:International travel is optional, I don't think it should effectively be funded by the taxpayer (I've paid for a PCR to go to SA and a LF on Day 2, incidentally I was sent a free PCR after being identified off my PLF, so that is the National Security bit ticked).


People travel for other reasons than pleasure.

No?

I don't disagree, but the fact there have been severe restrictions on travel for 18 months now has shown that it can be managed without for a relatively short time. If people can do their job effectively without even going to the office......
After we heard about the SA situation, having got back 8 days earlier, we called T&T and they said to go and do a PCR test (free). However, we were going to an event we were looking forward to the next day, so as the NHS one could take several days to come back, we booked and took an emergency, by midnight, test (£149) each which came back negative so we could do our event. Guess what, the NHS result came back in the morning....
T&T are now saying we still need to do the one they posted to us, presumably for stats and sequencing purposes. So in the last week it's 1 LF and 3 PCRs :lol:
I still stand by my assertion that if you want to leave the country, then it's your responsibility to pay for the things you need, passport, Travel Insurance, currency etc. The NHS long ago stopped giving Yellow Fever jabs for free.
User avatar
By Flyin'Dutch'
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1885090
malcolmfrost wrote:[
I don't disagree, but the fact there have been severe restrictions on travel for 18 months now has shown that it can be managed without for a relatively short time. If people can do their job effectively without even going to the office......
After we heard about the SA situation, having got back 8 days earlier, we called T&T and they said to go and do a PCR test (free). However, we were going to an event we were looking forward to the next day, so as the NHS one could take several days to come back, we booked and took an emergency, by midnight, test (£149) each which came back negative so we could do our event. Guess what, the NHS result came back in the morning....
T&T are now saying we still need to do the one they posted to us, presumably for stats and sequencing purposes. So in the last week it's 1 LF and 3 PCRs :lol:
I still stand by my assertion that if you want to leave the country, then it's your responsibility to pay for the things you need, passport, Travel Insurance, currency etc. The NHS long ago stopped giving Yellow Fever jabs for free.


As I wrote before it is less about the money more about the integrity.

As far as paying for what you use I am all with you.

Sadly you're making that shout at slightly the wrong person here. Since I am no longer residing in the UK I have no chance to ever get anything of my UK NI contributions I still have to make (no choice) nor will likely benefit from any of the tax paid in the UK*

I know, my choice - however, you might appreciate I don't particularly folks pontificating that travellers should pay for what they need for travel.

*'luckily' enough those amounts are now a lot less substantial because my SE business in the UK is all but annihilated due to C19/UK HMG management.

:) <- why the smiley you might wonder; Maybe because I never believed in putting all eggs in one basket. Besides which we are healthy.
#1885092
Flyin'Dutch' wrote:
As far as paying for what you use I am all with you.

Sadly you're making that shout at slightly the wrong person here. Since I am no longer residing in the UK I have no chance to ever get anything of my UK NI contributions I still have to make (no choice) nor will likely benefit from any of the tax paid in the UK*

I know, my choice - however, you might appreciate I don't particularly folks pontificating that travellers should pay for what they need for travel.

*'luckily' enough those amounts are now a lot less substantial because my SE business in the UK is all but annihilated due to C19/UK HMG management.

:) <- why the smiley you might wonder; Maybe because I never believed in putting all eggs in one basket. Besides which we are healthy.

Now I'm confused!
User avatar
By Flyin'Dutch'
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1885097
@malcolmfrost

Sorry to cause confusion!

Making a payment for a test is not the issue. It is paying it into the pockets of the incompetents I object to. I also think that when something is really important it should ideally be done by someone without just a profit objective.

Apparently Randox have massively increased the price of the PCR tests overnight.

That they are not an unscrupulous bunch we already know - they bought Patterson.
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User avatar
By Flyin'Dutch'
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1885098
malcolmfrost wrote:
Dutch officials say 13 of the 61 air passengers who tested for positive for Covid-19 after arriving in the Netherlands from South Africa were infected with the Omicron variant, but testing is still going on and the variant may be found in more test samples.


FOCs to the travelers..
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