need info re geneva and passports

A snowHead

Hi guys and gals, I've got a weird question for you:-

This wednesday coming (30th December) I'm going out to visit my rep friend in Brides Les bains (near Meribel). He has arranged to borrow a car for the day and pick us up from Geneva airport. Everything was fine with that until he had his brand new jacket stolen, which had his passport in (he'd just picked up his seasonaire lift pass, which was also in the jacket).

He has his UK drivers license on him, will he be able to use this to enter Switzerland? can he speak to the UK consulate in France and get a note excusing him (like at school with PE)?

Any help would be appreciated,

Many thanks,

Mike.

A snowHead

grimmy, I've not had my passport checked when driving into Switzerland, but if there are problems, there is an entrance to Geneva airport on the French side. If you look on the Geneva airport web site there is a map showing the way.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Well in practice I've never had my documents checked going into France from Geneva or vice versa but that isn't to say it couldn't happen and as Switzerland isn't EU to keep things legal you need a passport to cross the border.
That said given the efficiency of the Geneva bus system it probably wouldn't take much longer to get the border on a bus than it would for your mate to drive from the airport to the border. Then you could just walk across and meet him in France all nice and legal.
Or bow as Geepee says and use the French entrance to the airport.

You need to Login to know who's really who.

Drove a lot across the border last year and was never stopped, but geepee, and davkt, ideas seem sensible.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Given the IMMENSE hassle it is to drive to the French sector of Geneva without entering Switzerland, and given the low possibility of his being stopped, I'd say it was worth the risk of trying. But you'd just have to have a fall back in case - and then you'd have quite a wait for him to drive round. A good way to get the route is to go onto viamichelin.com and say you want to go from Brides Les Bains to Ferney Voltaire (where the French entrance is) without crossing international boundaries.

It's not straightforward - a proper printout from viamichelin.com would be essential unless he had a good map. I made myself a printout some years ago when I had visitors who had visas only for France - but we sailed through the two border points with no problem in the event.

I'd guess there was no prospect of a note from a British consulate - he'll need to get the passport replaced, obviously.

You'll need to Register first of course.

We have never had our passports scrutinised when driving to the airport in Geneva - the border people are always much more interested to see that you have a valid vignette. But we do have them in the car with us.

Just now though we don't have UK passports our passports were stolen in my bag from a motorway cafe on the drive down through France on 14th December.
For what it is worth to anyone else in similar position we visited the gendarmerie in Tanignes to report the theft as we needed a number of some sort for insurance purposes. The police there have given us temporary travel documents which are valid still for a few more days. We can travel in and out of France with these - but we can't travel by air. We then had to report the loss to the British authorities and apply for new passports. We downloaded forms for both of these purposes and luckily had scanned our passports in on the computer so that we knew the numbers, date of issue etc. The first lot of photos that we sent in were not high enough quality, but we got a call from the consulate in about 2 or 3 days to tell us that so we had more taken and sent those off. The guy that rang said the passports had been processed and it was just a case of waiting for the photos - so we expect the new ones to arrive any day now.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

I agree pam w, it is a very long way round to get to the French side of the airport. I am curious though as to what the border police would say if they caught you trying to enter without a passport. Commuting between France and Switzerland for over year, I was only stopped once. So I would give it a go, he can always say he forgot it, if stopped, rather than he doesn't have one. ,

After all it is free

grimmy, I spent quite a lot of the summer bring building materials from France into Switzerland. To get the VAT back from FRance there's a bit of a process requiring a passport. Anyway, one day I forgot it - and not only did I get myself through one of the main Swiss-France borders, I brought with me 40 sheets of plasterboard, 4 WCs, etc. Being a familiar face must have helped on the French side but the Swiss rotate border guards.

You'll probably be OK.

thanks for all the quick and really helpful replies guys, much appreciated. I've passed the info on to my ginger bearded rep friend. I reckon he'll try and get through the border without looking too guilty, but it's very useful to know that there is a french side of the airport. You know, just in case they lock the swiss border down against dodgy looking rep types Wink

Cheers
Grim

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

grimmy,

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

Switzerland is in Schengen, you don't need a passport to visit from France, your mates photo driving license is sufficient.

snow reports

davidof, what about the ginger beard though Little Angel

You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Thanks very much for all the information guys, we were able to get in and out of Geneva (multiple times) without any hassle whatsoever. It seems the swiss aren't as suspicious of ginger beards as us UK folk.

cheers,

Grim.

Help!!

need info re geneva and passports

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