South Africa: UK travellers lose thousands due to strict immigration rules

Two years after South Africa introduced the world’s most draconian immigration policy for visiting families, British travellers are still losing thousands of pounds because they are unaware of the strict rules.

Elizabeth Jardine and her family, from Rhayader in mid Wales, were denied boarding at Manchester airport and spent an extra £4,000 because they had the wrong type of birth certificate for their eight-year-old daughter.

Any under-18 arriving in South Africa must present an unabridged birth certificate. This contains both the child’s and the parents’ details. Many British families have only a “short” certificate, with details only of the child, because this is the one provided free of charge when a birth is registered.

The new rules were imposed by the South African Department of Home Affairs In June 2015, after several missed deadlines. They are intended to combat child abduction and trafficking of young people.

Within six months, an average of 10 families a day were being turned away at Heathrow for failing to comply fully with the new rules.

Airlines face fines from the South African authorities if they carry passengers under 18 who do not have the correct birth certificate and are therefore inadmissible.

The Jardine family had booked flights through the KLM website 10 months ahead at a cost of £1,915. They arrived at Manchester airport at 4.30am on 7 April for their flight via Amsterdam to South Africa.

“I had been into ‘manage your booking’ many times over the 10 months to check seats, meals, films etc,” said Ms Jardine.

“Not once was it obvious to me that I needed any further documentation to travel with our child.

“We had been to South Africa as a family in April 2015, with just our passports, and had no difficulty then.

“In about January 2017, my husband mentioned to me that we needed our daughter's birth certificate. This was the first I had been aware of the requirement.

“I then went back into ‘manage my booking’ and had to search for this information. There was a brief description on what was needed if travelling with both parents and then a more detailed description of what was needed when travelling with one parent or adoptive parents. As we are married and are both maternal and paternal to our daughter I thought no more about it.”

Ms Jardine was unaware that there are two kinds of birth certificates issued in the UK, and that South Africa demands the rarer, “Unabridged” version.

After the family were denied boarding, they say they were offered two options by KLM ground staff to travel once they had obtained the correct certificate: either a new outbound flight from Birmingham and using the homeward return for an administration fee of £4,800, or finding their own outbound flight but paying KLM a fee of £2,500 for the privilege of using their already paid-for homeward tickets.

They bought completely new tickets for £3,500, flying outbound on Air France via Paris and back via Amsterdam, ironically, on KLM.

Additional costs such as hotels took the total cost up to £4,000. The Dutch carrier has refunded them only £315 of the fare they originally paid, pocketing the remaining £1,600.

“For something so important and essential, surely the airline has a duty of care to make passengers travelling with children aware of this new, out of the ordinary, law?” said Ms Jardine.

A spokesperson for KLM said: “We regret to hear that a family was denied boarding in Manchester airport because they did not have an unabridged birth certificate.

“As with all immigration regulations, it is the passenger’s responsibility to ensure that they have the correct documentation required to travel.

“While our online reservation system does not have the capability to warn passengers about the immigration requirements for the country they wish to travel to, we do provide full details of the requirements for children travelling to South Africa on the KLM website.”

If both parents are not travelling with the child, the South African rules are more complicated and involve legally endorsed affidavits.

"Unfortunately, it has had a really negative effect on tourism because families who are met at the airport with what we were, just end up not going," said Ms Jardine.