If you’re taking your students on a school trip to Europe via ferry from Dover (particularly P&O or Irish Ferries), then you’ll want to read the guidance the DfE have just put out to help you take advantage of the new, speedier processing scheme.
And if you’re planning to travel during one of the peak travel periods (we’re talking summer, October half term, Christmas, Feb half term and Easter), it’s even more important, to prevent you being delayed at Dover unnecessarily.
Once you’re clear on the steps, it’s a fairly simple process that could save you some serious time.
You can check out the full guidance on the DfE’s website – but let’s take a quick look together now.
There are seven simple steps you’ll now be able to take to speed up processing times at Dover.
Step 1
The first thing you’ll need to do is to collect passenger info – this includes the drivers and any other accompanying adults.
You’ll need their name (first name and surname) as it appears on their passport (super important), their date of birth, nationality and the type of document they’re travelling on (which will normally be a passport, unless they’re EU nationals travelling on ID cards).
Step 2
Now you have all your passenger info, you’ll need to upload it to the spreadsheet provided by the ferry operator.
You’ll need to complete a separate spreadsheet for each coach – so, if your group is travelling on two coaches, you’ll need to complete two spreadsheets.
It’s really important that the data is submitted to the French authorities at Dover as they’ve requested, otherwise you won’t be able to use the speedy processing scheme.
Top tips
Don’t change the format of the spreadsheet (i.e. don’t add columns or rows, or anything like that).
Be careful that you’re putting in the correct data according to the column headings. So, if the column heading says ‘surname’, you must only input the passenger’s surname and not their first or middle name.
Make sure you don’t include any numbers or special characters in text fields (you don’t need to indicate who the driver is by inserting ‘driver’ in brackets on this form, for example).
And you’ll need to make sure you input passenger data in alphabetical order by surname.
Step 3
Now you’ve put together your spreadsheet(s), you need to save it as a .csv file. You’ll need to name the file with the first 7 letters of your school name, followed by the number of the coach (if you’re travelling on more than one coach).
So, Trinity School travelling on 3 coaches would have 3 .csv files named TRINITY1, TRINITY2 and TRINITY3. The French authorities won’t accept any spreadsheets that aren’t properly labelled (so, feel free to double check this with your Itinerary Coordinator if you’re not sure).
Very important – on the day of travel, your passengers will need to make sure they board the coach you assigned them to when putting the spreadsheets together (so, no coach-swapping!).
Step 4
Along with the spreadsheet(s) of passenger data, you’ll also need to provide evidence that you’re a school group and you’re travelling from a certified school. This can be as simple as a screenshot from one of the national databases (the DfE website lists which are accepted by the French authorities).
Step 5
Now you’ve got your passenger info and evidence that you’re an eligible school group, it’s time to send it to the ferry operator.
You’ll need to make sure you do this at least 72 hours before your travel or you won’t be allowed to take advantage of the scheme (which would be a massive shame if you’ve spent time gathering all this info).
Step 6
You’ll be pleased to hear that this step doesn’t involve you having to do anything.
Once they receive your passenger info and evidence of eligibility, the ferry operator will submit this to the French authorities.
What happens if anyone drops out last-minute? Don’t worry, passengers not being able to travel won’t affect your ability to use the faster processing scheme. However, if you do have any last-minute additions, they won’t be able to use the scheme if their info is submitted less than 72 hours before you travel (they’d have to go through standard processing – so, best to avoid adding passengers at this stage).
Step 7
The final step is to prepare the labels for each of the coaches ready for your departure.
Your ferry operator will send this in advance of your trip. You’ll need to write the name of the spreadsheet for each coach on this label and the number of passengers on the coach, and display it in the windscreen so the French authorities can quickly identify coaches participating in the scheme.
So, as per our example above, Trinity School would have three coaches. The first coach would have a label with TRINITY1 written on it and the passengers on that coach would be the ones listed on the TRINITY1 spreadsheet. If there are 48 people on that coach (and also listed on that spreadsheet – and remember, this includes the driver) then in a separate box on the label you would write ‘48’.
Further information can be found on the DfE website but, as always, if you have any questions about the process, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us as we’re always really pleased to help.