Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

You will need a negative covid test to enter England from next week – even for UK residents

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

In a significant change to the UK’s coronavirus policy, all international arrivals to England will be required to present a negative coronavirus test. This could begin as early as next Thursday as long as the required legislation can be passed.

Importantly, the rules applies to returning UK residents as well as visitors. There will apparently be opt-outs for arrivals from countries where testing is not easily available, as well as for arrivals from Ireland.

The test will need to have been taken up to 72 hours before BOARDING, not arrival. It applies to boats and trains as well as air arrivals.

Children under 11 will be exempt.

At present the law will only apply to arrivals in England but it is expected that the other devolved assemblies will agree to identical measures.

The penalty for arriving without a test will be £500. However, it only talks of Border Force doing ‘spot checks’ so it is possible that the onus will be placed on the airlines to police this.

You still need to quarantine, however

Frustratingly, arriving in the UK with a negative test result will NOT remove the requirement for a 10 day quarantine period for arrivals from countries not on the ‘travel corridors’ list, although this can be reduced if you take a further test after five days.

Full details are still to be published

Legislation will be required for this move, which will be brought before Parliament next week. We may not know the exact small print, such as what sort of tests will be accepted, which countries will be exempt and exactly what sort of paperwork will be accepted by Border Force, until then.

PS. The Government quietly slipped out some changes to the ‘travel corridors’ list yesterday without the usual fanfare. Botswana, Israel, Mauritius and Seychelles will be removed from the exempt list at 4am on Saturday 9th January. You will need to quarantine for 10 days, or take ‘test to release’ after 5 days, if you are returning from these countries.

Category

General

Comments (182)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Mike says:
    8 Jan8 January 08:57

    Really excellent news, this should have a positive impact on keeping Covid under control and protecting the NHS.

    • Andrew says:
      8 Jan8 January 12:34

      Can’t entirely tell if you’re being sarcastic or not but with 50,000 daily ‘cases’ from local transmission keeping out the miniscule number of people bringing it back from abroad who already weren’t following the quarantine rules won’t have any discernable effect whatsoever.

      • Alex W says:
        9 Jan9 January 07:36

        That’s exactly the sort of logic that has us leading the world for the number of deaths and cases. It’s already widespread so why bother trying to stop more cases coming in? That policy has worked fantastically well for the last year hasn’t it.

      • Mike Innes says:
        9 Jan9 January 13:22

        Your view completely ignores the fact that our Government wants to stop the South African new variant from gaining hold in the UK.

    • Julian says:
      9 Jan9 January 08:42

      This is hysterical knee jerk NIMBY nonsense of the worst kind that should be totally unnecessary at this stage in proceedings if the vaccines are all they are cracked up to be. If most people are vaccinated within the next 3 or 4 months then there is no need to worry about some new COVID infected people entering the country.

      As a strategy this approach might have made sense in April when no vaccines were anywhere on the horizon. Its implementation now is utterly nonsensical but is guaranteed to keep the travel industry on its knees and stop most ordinary summer holiday only type travellers from travelling abroad for several more years.

  • Bill says:
    8 Jan8 January 08:57

    Anyone know a PCR provider on the Algarve?

  • sloth says:
    8 Jan8 January 08:59

    10 months too late, but better late then never

  • kitten says:
    8 Jan8 January 09:01

    so poor people cant travel ?

    Was it announed in a forum where any reporter got a chance to ask Grant Schaps “Why now, when you could have done this months ago?” Or did they select a venue with a tame journalist

    • Nkp says:
      8 Jan8 January 09:12

      travel has always had its associated costs. one chooses something suited to their budget or doesn’t go.

      • ChrisW says:
        8 Jan8 January 09:17

        This. Travel is a luxury.

        • TGLoyalty says:
          8 Jan8 January 09:22

          Leisure travel is.

          There is essential travel like seeing loved ones at the end of their days, attending funerals and the like.

          • Stu N says:
            8 Jan8 January 10:47

            Frankly if a £80 PCR test is the difference between going and not going then I’d question how “essential” the travel really is.

      • kitten says:
        9 Jan9 January 04:53

        ‘one’ chooses. Enough said

        • Julian says:
          9 Jan9 January 08:50

          @Stu N

          The travel affected by the £80 charge may well not seem essential to an elitist overpaid Avios Billionaire like yourself but its the absolute life blood of Easyjet, Ryanair Whizz and all the other low cost airlines.

          Don’t you get it that most people already aren’t travelling now just due to the hassle with the quarantine at home (utterly miserable for any single person) and these extra measures will mean almost no one wants to leave the country apart from a few mega rich people who’s whole lifestyle revolves around international jetsetting.

          Of course all of it is setting up to reach a point where the authorities you won’t have to go through any of this hassle if you hold a valid vaccination certificate and so is effectively blackmail that you will have to be vaccinated to be able to travel freely.

    • Ben says:
      8 Jan8 January 09:32

      Cant win…
      COVID tests pre departure – typical Tory excluding the poor
      No COVID tests pre departure – Torys responsible for every single death
      Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

    • Chrisasaurus says:
      8 Jan8 January 10:42

      I think you probably know the answer to both of those questions, sadly

      • Nick says:
        8 Jan8 January 11:33

        If you can afford to travel you can afford to test.

        • Dr C says:
          8 Jan8 January 19:41

          Travelling now would of course have to be essential but if this test was to carry on to when restriction are relaxed its another story

    • Sandra says:
      9 Jan9 January 11:30

      Kitten. These days unless you’re a tame journalist or questions are agreed in advance I don’t think you are allowed to ask one 🙁

  • Stu N says:
    8 Jan8 January 09:03

    Good – finally some sense. Hopefully first step in getting things moving again in 2021 as better weather and vaccines start to bring the second wave under control. For now, hopefully the additional cost and hassle might make people think twice about whether their “property viewing in Spain” really is essential when we are in lockdown.

  • ankomonkey says:
    8 Jan8 January 09:06

    I’m hoping the testing is fairly short-lived and dropped once leisure travel is allowed again, purely because if I’m on holiday in a remote resort somewhere, seeking out and obtaining a test will be a big inconvenience. Not being (too) selfish here, but at some point we need to try to get back to normal.

    • Anna says:
      8 Jan8 January 09:44

      Presumably once sufficient people are vaccinated it won’t be required any more. You don’t get tested for anything else when you come back from abroad, after all.

      • Julian says:
        9 Jan9 January 08:59

        But absolutely none of these further and further waves of liberty infringing restrictions are about rationality but only about hysterical grandstanding knee jerk reactions by politicians to equally irresponsible hysterical coverage by journalists of a disease that has killed almost no one other than those soon about to die anyway.

        • Lisa says:
          9 Jan9 January 09:24

          Absolutely shocking that you think we should just not have any of these rules that might make it too expensive for you to go on holiday and we will just let people die as they were about to die anyway. I am sure you wouldn’t be saying that if it was your family. It’s evident that our restrictions weren’t tight enough and still are not. The countries that have controlled this virus well- New Zealand, Australia , Greece shut borders immediately and lock down with a handful of cases etc. There lockdown is not a game you can’t leave your house or you will be fined or arrested- but it’s worked and the aussies/kiwis are not making such a fuss as here. We should have done the same but because of people like you there would have been uproar here if they had done that. We all want to go on holiday but it’s not important at the moment when thousands are dying. Holidays will return and when it’s safe no tests will be needed

        • Alan says:
          9 Jan9 January 13:55

          What total utter unadulterated claptrap. I take it you haven’t read any of the reports of the folks in their 40s with no previous medical conditions dying? Or given a moment’s thought to the people who don’t have COVID but will be affected due to reduced NHS capacity? A friend in NW England is converting their Paeds ICU to take adults, with a consequent knock on effect that kids may have to travel further to get an ICU bed and that their elective surgery will be postponed.

          • kk says:
            9 Jan9 January 21:41

            There are plenty of people in their forties with no pre-existing conditions dying from many other causes.

    • Oh! Matron! says:
      8 Jan8 January 11:09

      “but at some point we need to try to get back to normal.”

      Which will be when we’ve all had the vaccine and the virus doesn’t exist any more. And not a day before.

      • Rhys says:
        8 Jan8 January 11:21

        Actually, it will probably be before then, when all the high-risk groups have been vaccinated, since this is where the majority of severe cases are.

      • Dr C says:
        8 Jan8 January 19:41

        Yeah right, thats not possible

    • Mayfair Mike says:
      9 Jan9 January 10:12

      Incredible comment

  • YC says:
    8 Jan8 January 09:08

    Risk of testing positive abroad and either being confined to your hotel or gov. facility. Significant barrier to travel

    • Rob says:
      8 Jan8 January 09:16

      Not necessarily, because you would be taking a private test abroad. If you came back positive it will not necessarily be reported to the authorities. You could quietly isolate in your hotel.

      • sloth says:
        8 Jan8 January 09:42

        well it should be reported to the authorities so people do what they should be doing ie isolate! instead of doing what they want and increasing the transmission

      • YC says:
        8 Jan8 January 11:26

        Yeah but staying in a hotel for an additional 10nights is a big cost not a lot be willing to take. (Not just cost of hotel but if u have other responsibilities that can’t be done remotely or abroad)

        • Paul says:
          9 Jan9 January 06:56

          The risk of going away, and then testing positive b4 return and thus having to stay away for much longer, is surely going to stop pretty much all (remaining) travellers.

      • DeB20 says:
        8 Jan8 January 13:10

        Not quite true Rob. In many countries in Asia, including in India where I am right now, positive results are reported to the authorities and institutional quarantine kicks in, paid for by the patient. This is unavoidable.

      • HAM76 says:
        8 Jan8 January 21:14

        In Germany every positive test result is immediately reported to the authorities.

      • kitten says:
        9 Jan9 January 04:59

        I’m sure I understand.
        You lost me at “If you came back positive’.

        Do I, seriously, want you on a plane with me or anywhere near me if you’ve tested positive.

        I’d be prepared to contribute to helping those in such a situation, but I dont want them anywhere near me

        I truly think I must have misunderstood you.

        • Rob says:
          9 Jan9 January 10:17

          You have misunderstood. The original comment was that people wouldn’t take a private test abroad because a positive result would mean being reported to the police and then facing whatever is meted out in that country.

          I am saying that this isn’t true and that in most countries a positive result from a private lab is not reported to the authorities. Obviously you can’t board a plane because you don’t have a negative result, but you can go and hole up in your existing hotel without any risk of being locked up in a Government approved facility.

  • Kurt Kraut says:
    8 Jan8 January 09:09

    Pretty pointless decision, at least with the quarantine requirements still remaining but obviously fits well with the post Brexit view of the world.

    • Andrew says:
      8 Jan8 January 12:43

      Because not a single EU member has a similar requirement?

      You can blame brexit for a lot of things but we’ve kept our borders open far, far longer than most of the EU.

      • Alex W says:
        9 Jan9 January 07:40

        Na we got r cantry back we can keep out then foreign viruses!

        • Julian says:
          9 Jan9 January 09:09

          @Alex W If we got our country back then its weird so much of London and other major UK cities (eg Manchester and Leicester) are now inhabited by people who were either born in remote parts of the third world or who’s were born there……………..

      • Julian says:
        9 Jan9 January 09:07

        @Andrew.

        You are spouting utter tosh.

        The Germans currently buying our apartment in Mallorca can still go there and return home without having to undergo any quarantine at all. Their only restriction is having to take a PCR test before arriving in Spain.

        UK already has the some harshest restrictions on travel with the 14 day quarantine on returning home. Other than Australia and NZ who clearly don’t want people to travel at all.

        Also none of these measures either work or are practical in the long term and they are out of all proportion to the actual risk of death or injury from the disease in question.

        In my opinion it is the hysterical media induced fear of the virus and of death (which happens all the time in numerous other ways but are not hysterically over reported by an irresponsible media) and not the virus that is the main problem.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Latest Forum Posts

Get 40,000 bonus points (worth 40,000 Avios) and £300 dining credit with The Platinum Card

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get £10 when you spend £150 on your free Currensea card

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? EARN POINTS WORTH 10,500 AVIOS WITH CAPITAL ON TAP

Get 20,000 bonus points, four airport lounge passes and your first year free with American Express Gold

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!