🇪🇺 EES Explained - Everything You Need to Know about the new EU Entry Exit System

If you are planning to visit France, Germany, Italy, Norway or indeed any other country within the Schengen zone, then you need to know about EES, the new border system which is going to change the way that we enter the EU or Schengen zone. It's going to mean no more passport stamps. It's going to mean no more overstays for your whole 90 and 180 days. It's going to mean much stricter, tighter controls over the border and it's going to mean an awful lot of queues. In this video, we're going to dive into exactly what you need to do before your next trip into Europe. Hi, I'm Kat from Wandering Bird and I am here to help motorhomers and camp planners make the absolute most of their time on the road, particularly those who want to travel into either the EU or the Schengen zone and don't want to get stuck at borders for hours whilst waiting for the queues with this new EES border system in place. So let's dive in on the best way to make the most of your time. So what is EES? EES stands for Entry Exit System and it is the new border control system which will be on the external Schengen zone borders. So all of the countries within the Schengen zone, which is most of the EU, will have this electronic border system in place. So it's going to replace the passport stamping and in place you will need to provide your passport. You still need to travel with your passport but you will then need to provide biometric data which is the photo and fingerprints. This data will be stored for about three years at which point when you next go through the border you will be asked to update it or replace it so you have to go through the fingerprinting and the photos and everything all over again. And it is basically going to be a much stricter way of tracking people who are not Schengen residents, which is basically us in the UK and all the other third party countries. Now it is the Schengen zone so this does apply to countries which aren't in the EU which is notably places like Norway and Switzerland but some countries which are in the EU but aren't in the Schengen zone like Ireland and Cyprus aren't going to put EES in place so you will still have passport stamps in there when you visit those countries. Now this isn't new, this has been coming in for years and they keep pushing it back and we are now the week before it is due to go live and they haven't pushed it back yet. So at the moment the start date is the 12th October 2025. Now it will not go live at every single country or on the same day, it is going to be a phased rollout and the exact dates for every single border will vary. But just be aware that this is something that is coming and if you travel into the Schengen zone over the next six months, they are hoping it will all be up and running by April 2026, then absolutely you will have to do this at some point on your journey. So how will it work? Well on your first crossing into one of the Schengen zone borders you will need to provide your passport, they will scan that and then alongside your passport they will ask you for a photograph of your face and then you will also need to give some fingerprint information. Now this will apply to everybody who is travelling including kids under 12, they won't be fingerprinted but a photograph will still be taken and they will need to travel alongside a parent or guardian and the data will be logged alongside those. Then on subsequent crossings of Schengen borders you will just need to provide your passport and there will be a quick biometric scan and that will then be logged against your time in the EU, they will be able to check how long you've been in certain areas and it's basically giving them much stricter control over who is within their borders. Now things to understand is that everybody will be asked to disembark from the vehicle and go through the process, so expect to be asked to get out of your vehicle when you go through this but also expect enormous queues. They anticipate this to take about one minute per person but if you have got a coach load of say 50 people in front of you it's going to be 50 minutes plus them getting off and getting back on the coach again, so it's going to be about an hour if you're waiting behind them, so the queues are going to be enormous. Obviously once the first few months have been and gone a lot of people will already be registered so it will be a lot quicker, so my advice for you if you are travelling within the next sort of six to eight months into somewhere within the Schengen zone, try and travel at the more unsociable hours if you don't want to get stuck in long queues. Now as I mentioned it does not apply to countries like Ireland or Cyprus, so when you're going in there you will just provide your passport as normal and expect the stamps and of course if you've got an EU residency or a long stay visa card then it doesn't apply to you either. Now it's important to underline that EES is not the same as ETIAS, ETIAS is a visa or technically a visa waiver which you will need to apply for in advance of your trip, for EES you don't need to do anything in advance, you don't need to apply for anything in advance, it's literally when you turn up at the border for your ferry or your tunnel crossing that you will then need to provide this biometric data. ETIAS is something that's due to come in in 2026 but can't come in until EES is up and has been running for several months, so as that gets closer to the official time I will put out another video all about that for you. So what do you need to do now? Well in all honesty not a lot, obviously it's really important to check the validity on your passport, make sure you've got at least 6 months, now the 6 months comes from if you're spending 90 days in the EU or the Schengen zone, then that's 90 days or 3 months for the sake of argument, and then they want you to have at least 3 months left after your planned departure date of the Schengen zone, so that's where the 6 months comes from, so just check you've got enough time in your passport before you actually need it, and the other thing to do is just anticipate there to be much longer queues, so if you've got say a set ferry or a set tunnel, perhaps arrive a little bit earlier or perhaps a lot earlier than you might otherwise do just to make sure you get through in time. The other thing that might become a little bit more relevant whilst these new things are coming into place are things like the legal requirement, it's an EU law that you must be able to provide proof of funds to sustain yourself whilst you're in the EU, now there are a huge variety of ways that you could do this, some people choose to carry bank statements and there are actually some countries which have published how much they expect you to have access to when you are touring in those countries, so let me just read this data so I don't get it wrong, so for example Spain and France have provided dailies of around 60 to 100 euros per person whilst you are in your country, and they can at the border ask you to show that you have got those proof of funds to sustain yourself. Now this has been law since we left the EU years ago, but it's never really been a thing, however there is a chance that with the new border security, new border checks, everybody being under scrutiny, that the border guards might actually ask you for this sort of data, so perhaps you might want to bring a bank statement, you might want to just have access to your bank accounts on your phone or iPad so that if you are asked you can provide proof of it, you also, an alternative to having to provide this sort of information is proof that you have prepaid your accommodation and also proof that you've got your return journey. Now I still travel around the EU, I don't book my return journey details up and indeed I've never been asked to show this information, but it is just something which might occur more frequently, especially if the guards themselves are being assessed and are having to do everything perfectly by the book. Now if you are travelling with your motorhome or your campervan, I've got a free checklist which tells you all the other gear that you legally need to provide with you, so you can download that, the link is in the notes. I've also provided a couple of links to important websites with EES information, just in case anything changes since I record this video so you can check the most recent and up-to-date information. And if you are going touring in the Schengen zone and want more help with the whole 90 and 180 day rules, then this video will help. Thank you as always for watching, if you found it useful don't forget to like and subscribe and I'll see you on the next video. Take care, bye!