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Has Schengen system changed?


Has Schengen system changed?

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Daftbugger
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BenS - 11 Sep 19 9:38 AM
JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.

Thanks for this advice, I will use this when I come off, good to know, cheers.

I'm not sure if this is helpful, but I thought that I'd relate my experiences over the past 12 months:

Firstly I have frequently travelled in and out of Europe since I was registered on the SoR and the only problem has been on return to the UK when my passport wouldn't go through the automatic readers, of course. However last December, my wife an dI were travelling to Brussels on the Eurostar. The French passport check seemed to go Ok, but the guard called me back and asked for my passport, which I gave him and he then walked me off to an office wont he side of the checkin area and sat me outside while he took my passport in. My wife was let standing, wondering what was going on. Eventually after about 10 suites, 2 Transport Police officers arrived and asked me what was going on! They went inside and came out to explain that because they were on UK soil they had access to more info on the UK PNC than their colleagues in France. The SoR flag comes up differently when they see it and it says that they should check me out. They hadn't seen this before, hence they were confused. Obviously the BTP had to record this as an incident... We did catch the train, just and my wife was visibly upset by the whole thing as she was just left standing there. When we returned, I just passed straight through the passport controls in Brussels, without incident. So this seemed to bear out whatI had been told.

In February we flew to Grenoble. Again I was stopped by the French passport control. They were obviously confused. Who was I travelling with (my long suffering wife, again). I had to bring her back for the baggage reclaim so they could check her passport as well. After about 5 minutes of discussion between the officers, they returned our passports and we went on our way. On return to the airport a week later, the French passport checker ran my passport through the scan and looked puzzled. She called over a colleague and they both looked at the computer screen. I was asked a series of questions: where had I been, did I come to France often. Again after about 5 to 10 minutes they returned my passport and we went on our way. Some people we had met on the holiday were waiting with my wife and wanted to know what had happened and why (not unreasonably). I said there seemed to be something funny when they checked my passport. This was embarrassing but could have been a lot worse.

I was due to go away to Greece this month with some friends who are unaware of my offending, and in view of what I have read here about the way that Greek passport controllers are reacting to the new information I decided to cancel my trip.

It seems that the information is being treated very differently by different countries: the french seem to be very vigilant, the Belgians much less so. But I have decided that I won't be travelling abroad with any friends until my time is up on the Sor (less than 3 years, now).

But all this doesn't seem to chime with the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act or the Right to be Forgotten. One by product of this is that I have had to start lying to my friends, which kind of goes against the "no lies" mantra that we used during the ISOTP training.

Sorry it's a bit of a ramble, but it helps to get it off my chest.
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JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
Completely up to you how you approach it but my advice is don’t over think it, particularly as ACRO requests can take a few weeks to come back and the 31st October deadline is fast approaching. I also don’t believe that ACRO will tell you whether there’s any alerts on your file as ACRO only shows what the U.K. Police hold on you. SIS is maintained outside the U.K. and the U.K. only has a restricted level of access to it.All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.SIS2 isn’t the only database that they need to update when you come off the SoR. There’s also ViSOR which is linked to the Home Office watchlist that Border Force (or whatever they’re now called) use when they scan your passport. PPU won’t delete your ViSOR report - most probably just ‘archive’ it - but once that’s done you won’t then have issues on return back to the UK.

When you say '"they need to update" who are 'they' ? When I raised the possibility of continuing to have problems my PPO claimed he didn't know anything about SISII as he didn't have anything to do with Schengen and he'd never heard of a Home Office watch list' . He told me  to write to the chief constable if I continued to be stopped. Was he just being unhelpful? Anyway I'll do both,  write to chief constable and do the acro request
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Daftbugger - 11 Sep 19 2:26 PM
BenS - 11 Sep 19 9:38 AM
JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.

Thanks for this advice, I will use this when I come off, good to know, cheers.

I'm not sure if this is helpful, but I thought that I'd relate my experiences over the past 12 months:

Firstly I have frequently travelled in and out of Europe since I was registered on the SoR and the only problem has been on return to the UK when my passport wouldn't go through the automatic readers, of course. However last December, my wife an dI were travelling to Brussels on the Eurostar. The French passport check seemed to go Ok, but the guard called me back and asked for my passport, which I gave him and he then walked me off to an office wont he side of the checkin area and sat me outside while he took my passport in. My wife was let standing, wondering what was going on. Eventually after about 10 suites, 2 Transport Police officers arrived and asked me what was going on! They went inside and came out to explain that because they were on UK soil they had access to more info on the UK PNC than their colleagues in France. The SoR flag comes up differently when they see it and it says that they should check me out. They hadn't seen this before, hence they were confused. Obviously the BTP had to record this as an incident... We did catch the train, just and my wife was visibly upset by the whole thing as she was just left standing there. When we returned, I just passed straight through the passport controls in Brussels, without incident. So this seemed to bear out whatI had been told.

In February we flew to Grenoble. Again I was stopped by the French passport control. They were obviously confused. Who was I travelling with (my long suffering wife, again). I had to bring her back for the baggage reclaim so they could check her passport as well. After about 5 minutes of discussion between the officers, they returned our passports and we went on our way. On return to the airport a week later, the French passport checker ran my passport through the scan and looked puzzled. She called over a colleague and they both looked at the computer screen. I was asked a series of questions: where had I been, did I come to France often. Again after about 5 to 10 minutes they returned my passport and we went on our way. Some people we had met on the holiday were waiting with my wife and wanted to know what had happened and why (not unreasonably). I said there seemed to be something funny when they checked my passport. This was embarrassing but could have been a lot worse.

I was due to go away to Greece this month with some friends who are unaware of my offending, and in view of what I have read here about the way that Greek passport controllers are reacting to the new information I decided to cancel my trip.

It seems that the information is being treated very differently by different countries: the french seem to be very vigilant, the Belgians much less so. But I have decided that I won't be travelling abroad with any friends until my time is up on the Sor (less than 3 years, now).

But all this doesn't seem to chime with the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act or the Right to be Forgotten. One by product of this is that I have had to start lying to my friends, which kind of goes against the "no lies" mantra that we used during the ISOTP training.

Sorry it's a bit of a ramble, but it helps to get it off my chest.

That sounds pretty traumatic, and as you'll see in other posts in this thread the end of your time on the SOR might not be the end of border problems. At least you had your wife with you for support, I felt more vulnerable being on my own. I'm going back to Greece shortly and really worried about being stopped again and harassed when I shouldn't be. Also going to Belgium before Xmas and that doesn't sound good unless I can get this sorted out.

As there are obviously several ppl being affected post SOR it's obviously  a general problem of the sort you'd hope Unlock and Nacro would raise with authorities as like you say it goes against the whole principle of rehabilitation.



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JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
Completely up to you how you approach it but my advice is don’t over think it, particularly as ACRO requests can take a few weeks to come back and the 31st October deadline is fast approaching. I also don’t believe that ACRO will tell you whether there’s any alerts on your file as ACRO only shows what the U.K. Police hold on you. SIS is maintained outside the U.K. and the U.K. only has a restricted level of access to it.All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.SIS2 isn’t the only database that they need to update when you come off the SoR. There’s also ViSOR which is linked to the Home Office watchlist that Border Force (or whatever they’re now called) use when they scan your passport. PPU won’t delete your ViSOR report - most probably just ‘archive’ it - but once that’s done you won’t then have issues on return back to the UK.

To be fair, although ACRO doesn't maintain SIS II or have full access to it, they should have access to the information uploaded or notified by the police over here.

=========================================================================================================

If you are to punish a man retributively you must injure him. If you are to reform him you must improve him. And men are not improved by injuries. (George Bernard Shaw)

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BenS - 11 Sep 19 9:38 AM
JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.

Thanks for this advice, I will use this when I come off, good to know, cheers.

Not had a reply from Police yet but on returning to UK I got through the e-gates for the first time ever. However I've just travelled to Greece and was again stopped. A lot of conversation in Greek between 2 police and I was let through though it was very tense and embarrassing as there was a big queue behind me. When I got through the e-gates coming back last time I thought it had all been sorted, obviously not. 
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forever changes - 28 Sep 19 7:11 PM
BenS - 11 Sep 19 9:38 AM
JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.

Thanks for this advice, I will use this when I come off, good to know, cheers.

Not had a reply from Police yet but on returning to UK I got through the e-gates for the first time ever. However I've just travelled to Greece and was again stopped. A lot of conversation in Greek between 2 police and I was let through though it was very tense and embarrassing as there was a big queue behind me. When I got through the e-gates coming back last time I thought it had all been sorted, obviously not. 

This sounds like you have been removed from the UK watch system but presumably still have a live alert on the SISII system. It should drop off over time I think.
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tedstriker - 30 Sep 19 10:56 AM
forever changes - 28 Sep 19 7:11 PM
BenS - 11 Sep 19 9:38 AM
JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.

Thanks for this advice, I will use this when I come off, good to know, cheers.

Not had a reply from Police yet but on returning to UK I got through the e-gates for the first time ever. However I've just travelled to Greece and was again stopped. A lot of conversation in Greek between 2 police and I was let through though it was very tense and embarrassing as there was a big queue behind me. When I got through the e-gates coming back last time I thought it had all been sorted, obviously not. 

This sounds like you have been removed from the UK watch system but presumably still have a live alert on the SISII system. It should drop off over time I think.

I think this is something they have to delete, rather than wait for it to expire. I'm not sure who to contact, but the police generally seem to refer all this stuff to an "International Section", maybe at the Home Office, who deal with it. If your former PPU contact doesn't know what to do, try the Data Protection Officer at your local force's HQ, as they will certainly know who deals with it.

=========================================================================================================

If you are to punish a man retributively you must injure him. If you are to reform him you must improve him. And men are not improved by injuries. (George Bernard Shaw)

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AB2014 - 1 Oct 19 9:48 AM
tedstriker - 30 Sep 19 10:56 AM
forever changes - 28 Sep 19 7:11 PM
BenS - 11 Sep 19 9:38 AM
JohnL - 11 Sep 19 7:49 AM
All I did was send a registered letter to my PPU and two weeks later I got a reply back saying that any remaining flags had been deleted and that I shouldn’t now have any problems. And since then I haven’t had any issues whatsoever at the border either returning to the U.K. or entering another country.

Thanks for this advice, I will use this when I come off, good to know, cheers.

Not had a reply from Police yet but on returning to UK I got through the e-gates for the first time ever. However I've just travelled to Greece and was again stopped. A lot of conversation in Greek between 2 police and I was let through though it was very tense and embarrassing as there was a big queue behind me. When I got through the e-gates coming back last time I thought it had all been sorted, obviously not. 

This sounds like you have been removed from the UK watch system but presumably still have a live alert on the SISII system. It should drop off over time I think.

I think this is something they have to delete, rather than wait for it to expire. I'm not sure who to contact, but the police generally seem to refer all this stuff to an "International Section", maybe at the Home Office, who deal with it. If your former PPU contact doesn't know what to do, try the Data Protection Officer at your local force's HQ, as they will certainly know who deals with it.

Just got back to uk and re-experienced the freedom of going through the e-gates for 2nd time - plus when I got home there was a letter from PPU saying 'this alert' has now been removed. Great relief and thanks for all the replies, advice and support I felt from the forum while I went through this discomfort

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Came of the SOR middle of September I had a holiday booked after that date so didn't have to notify, tried automatic gate at Malaga airport wouldn't let me through had to go to a booth I was then asked if I was travelling alone and where I was staying which he noted down the officer was very nice and I enjoyed my holiday.
I got in touch with PPU and he told me it was probably random (bullshit) he also said he had contacted the department to make sure the system was updated, on the way home I got through automatic gate at Malaga and the E gate in UK no bother, as I probably won't be using it for at least six months the concern is always there that I  will same problem next time.....golf holiday with a few mates.

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Interesting 
. I travelled and passed through the  e gate in and out of another  EU country. No issues. 

Came back to  UK and the only option was manual border force station, only question "how was your time in ..........?' 



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