Elderly couple banned from flight after making easy mistake – & lose £5,000

A COUPLE were banned from boarding their flight for their first holiday since Covid after making an easy mistake.

Bob and Gillian Banks had booked flights to travel to Munich and Milan together.

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However, after arriving for their KLM flight at Newcastle Airport, Dr Banks, 74, a scientist and neurobiology expert, was told his passport was invalid.

This is because of new rules in the EU, requiring Brits to have passports that are no more than 10 years old.

He told Chronicle Live: “My passport was initially looked at by a trainee who was going to let me through but a senior member of staff looked over the trainee’s shoulder at my passport said it wasn’t valid for travel.

“The explanation was that due to the rule changes in January, the expiry date was simply 10 years after the date of issue, not the date given in the passport, which clearly stated its expiry date to be April 5, 2023.”

“It was awful. We were both looking forward so much to our first holiday in such a long time, a chance to see old friends, and we didn’t even make it through the departure gates.”

Not only were they left devastated, but Dr Banks was also forced to miss his science talk in Munich, as well as his holiday to Milan after.

Along with flights and hotels, they said they’ve lost out on as much as £5,000.

A Swissport spokesperson said that the new EU policies mean their passport would expire in August, so it was “not valid for the required three months when travelling to the EU”.

Sun Online Travel has contacted KLM for additional comment.

Sadly, they aren’t the first to be caught out by the new rules.

Meg Gordon had booked a holiday to Portugal with her husband Andy and 16-year-old twins Jasmine and Dylan – but was unable to board due to her passport being out of date.

Previous rules allowed Brits to roll over up to nine months from their old passports when renewing them.

However, these nine months no longer count, causing problems for travellers.

Passports must be no older than ten years from the start date, so the expiry date could be incorrect.

And new Brexit rules require Brits to have at least three months left on their passport to travel to EU countries.

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