A female who is legally settled successful the UK was near stranded astatine a Spanish airdrome aft the Home Office’s post-Brexit visa strategy mixed her up pinch her copy sister.
Nidia Webb fell foul of what she was told was a “known issue” pinch the eVisa, which was brought successful arsenic portion of the government’s thrust to digitise the UK’s migration strategy but has faced problems that person caused interest for thousands of people.
Politico reported that Webb, who has lived successful the UK for 8 years, was told astatine the departure gross she would not beryllium capable to committee her formation home. “My integer settled position had go linked to my identical copy sister’s specifications alternatively than my own, meaning my position could not beryllium decently matched to my identity,” she said.
“I was informed that this is simply a known method rumor affecting immoderate twins wrong the Home Office system.”
Webb said Home Office unit promised her complete the telephone the problem would beryllium fixed, though a confirmation email was past sent to her sister alternatively of to her.
“I had nary thought the rumor had been corrected until I was allowed to committee my formation home,” Webb said. “Had I not spent hours connected the telephone trying to resoluteness the matter, I person nary thought really agelong I could person remained stranded abroad.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “Over 10 cardinal group person already successfully utilized eVisas to beryllium their migration status. As we grow our integer system, we are committed to information accuracy and ensuring that the safeguards successful spot to support eVisa users are accessible to anyone reliant connected the integer system.
“In the uncommon cases wherever errors are identified, the mostly of cases are resolved wrong 24 hours.” The Home Office indicated the problem Webb encountered had since been fixed and that unit would interaction her directly.
Serious concerns person been expressed astir the eVisa system. In July 2025, the Guardian reported up to 200,000 group who had lived successful the UK legally for decades were astatine consequence of being caught up successful a Windrush-style scandal because the Home Office was incapable to get successful touch pinch them to transportation their aged migration documents to the caller integer system.
Monique Hawkins, the acting main executive of the migration run group the3million, said it had seen erstwhile cases akin to Webb’s, adding that it highlighted vulnerabilities successful the strategy and it was “crucial that group person a genuinely unchangeable intends by which to beryllium their status”.
She told Politico the eVisa rollout had been “rushed”, adding: “We regularly spot group not only denied boarding, but besides compensation, arsenic carriers and the Home Office play a blasted crippled shifting work betwixt each other.”
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