Late on 16 July the FCDO amended its France travel pages, flagging rolling 24-hour strikes by RATP metro and suburban rail staff from 18 July. The advisory notes that walkouts could spread to border police unions demanding overtime payments for EES implementation at Channel Tunnel and Eurostar exits. The update reiterates that UK passport-holders must have at least three months’ validity beyond their intended departure from the Schengen area. With EES not yet fully operational in France, passports will continue to be physically stamped, a practice that business travellers must monitor closely to avoid breaching the 90/180-day limit. Eurostar has already emailed corporate account-holders urging employees to arrive 60 minutes before departure while manual stamping remains in force. Travel-risk firm Anvil says clients are seeing a 15-minute increase in processing at London St Pancras because French Police aux Frontières now photograph every non-EU traveller. Employers running frequent Paris day trips may wish to switch to virtual meetings until the strikes subside. Where travel is essential, mobility teams should track passport stamps electronically—many firms now use OCR apps to log entry and exit marks and flag potential overstays. The Embassy in Paris says it will update the advisory again if the strikes are called off or if the French Senate passes emergency legislation to fund EES staffing over the August holiday peak.
