OK; IME it doesn’t work in the UK or N Europe / France Italy or Croatia. Vacc or test certificates are requested.
This has just come out – back to the old days
but fortunately it is the LFT which is not a problem.
I am pretty sure the solution for a day trip or a short trip to the UK, or out of the UK, has not changed: a single PCR test covers both. The challenge is that those visiting the UK need to have the test result before entering the UK. Just like was the case when I went to Italy in Oct 2020… the timing is not easy if doing a PCR.
It is thus much easier to do trips into the UK using the LFT (for which you can get a certificate by email, instantly, by emailing them a photo of a negative test – e.g. c19) and for the day 2 (which is a PCR) you just need “some way” to file the PLF form, test or no test done, and since you won’t be in the UK for any time afterwards you can just say you are the Pope on Vatican official business, or one of the more credible exemptions like aeronautical engineer.
Test prices went up immediately 
The latest UK vacc certificate now shows all three doses.
I have to say that GA travel is vastly more civilised than airline travel.
Gatwick to Milan Malpensa today, Easyjet. At the UK end they check the Italian vacc requirements (the dual vacc, the negative LFT test, and the Italian PLF) but only from 1m away so you could photoshop it. At the Italian end, nobody looks at anything other than your passport, which could be because they know the UK end has already “checked” them, but I very much doubt it. The passport checking procedure is horrid though; the usual “brexit punishment”, lumping UK passports with the “Nigerians” and putting just one passport officer in to do a few hundred of them. Same as in Friedrichshafen 3 years ago (“you have already left the EU”) but back then it was with the Russians 
Admittedly, after all EU nationals went through the self-scan passport points they let Brits use them, but only until the girl got bored announcing it and then she disappeared. I found her and got her to let us go through. The self scan machines let you through even with your mask on so they can’t be doing much of a face comparison
Then to round things off nicely the taxi driver didn’t turn up, and it turned out that their website booking “magically created” a collection time much later in the day, which I could not have possibly entered. €320 down the drain; the crook won’t refund it. €380 to another driver fixed it. This is not new; I have been ripped off a few times by ski transports, some not turning up at all and then shouting down the phone that you were supposed to phone their emergency contact number, with Paypal refunds working but this was done with a CC so will be harder. But this is off topic for this thread
Whereas if I had flown to Aosta in the TB20, everything would be checked in minutes with a smile and I would be in a €150 taxi 10 mins later. That’s the plan for January. I have a totally flexible apartment which is off the market, which is ideal for GA travel.
Well, in January the world may have changed, with this new one doubling every 3 days or so. You never know… but current numbers in Italy are very low, and they need the money.
Procedurally it is easy enough. The LFT test to enter Italy is £22 using C19 who email the negative certificate after a few hours. They used to have an auto-responder for it but it looks like somebody rumbled them The Italian PLF form (actually it is an “EU” PLF form but I am not sure how many countries it does) is more of a hassle; takes about half an hour, and each person has to create an account. It doesn’t work in Chrome; I used Firefox. I am pretty sure nobody ever looks at what you type in (like with the UK PLF). The vacc certificate you need to carry but as I said nobody at Malpensa looked at it, whereas the police at Aosta definitely want to see it (along with all the other paperwork).
So, overall, Italy is easy to travel to right now. I’d say a lot fewer people on the slopes – maybe 50%. Mask wearing everywhere, except of course if you have a buff covering your face, and if you are alone in the enclosed lift (first couple of hours each day, before the youngsters sober up from their apres-ski ) then it is fine anyway.
For the return to UK LFT test you can use C19 again so that’s another £22. You bring those with you on the trip. Then the UK has the Day 2 PCR and isolation until a negative result surfaces; that’s another story. All these tests have easy ways to ensure a negative result though.
It is universally true that at big airline airports, most of these things are not checked systematically. That would be impossible. But at smaller GA airports (with customs facilities) you can be quite sure they will check all of it, as the staff there has nothing else to do.
OT, but you pre-paid or pre-authorized 320€ for a taxi booking? Why? Apart from that, I know nobody else pays these amounts for taxis… Most people will not use a taxi for anything costing more than 100€, or 50€, rather, except maybe in an emergency situation. Anyway, enjoyed your holiday. Lots of snow at Aosta today, and nothing but sunshine for the next week!
I normally use ski shuttles for that, and this trip would have cost about €130 each way. I used a taxi this time to reduce CV19 exposure, and accepted the large cost as reasonable for that. Also the ski shuttles don’t run on weekdays, which is also a very big factor in how full the airliner will be (ours was maybe 20% full). Weekday travel is a great secret Of course it is crazy to pay this much on any rational assessment. But even “ski buses” have gone wrong; I had one not turn up a while ago and ended up on a bus, 2 trains, and a £250 taxi to Verona. Yes; next week looks ok although they did mention strong winds which may shut down some or all of the slopes.
I still think Aosta in the winter is a great EuroGA meet-up location, and crucially remains very doable via GA in these difficult times, but for whatever reason a fly to ski seems impossible to organise. I will post in the ad-hoc thread and in the telegram group (yet again )
From here
This came up here repeatedly and I heard it somewhere but despite me asking for it, nobody found a reference for it. IOW, the Day 2 test does the job of the pre return to the UK test. bq.
This is referenced here:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-testing-for-people-travelling-to-england
Taking your test in the UK before travel
If you are returning to the UK within 2 days, you can use the result of a COVID-19 test that you take in the UK before you travel. You must use a private test provider for the test and not an NHS test.
The service on which you will arrive back in the UK must set off for the UK within 2 days of when you took the test, or within 2 days of the start of the first leg of your journey for multi-leg journeys.
Can it be a LFT? If so, day trips are much more doable because a) the cost is less and b) you don’t have to isolate after such a short trip abroad.
Of course. It says
This could include tests such as:
a nucleic acid test, including a PCR test
a LAMP test
an antigen test, such as an LFD (lateral flow device) test
But bear in mind this is for the Pre-departure test before travelling back. It doesn’t replace the Day2 PCR
For a short trip to France this works well as you could use the LFT test as the test to get into France and that same test will satisfy getting back to the UK.
In that case it is not what I was getting at, which was a single test to cover all requirements.
Think about it this way: let’s say somebody wants to visit the UK for a day or two. They are supposed to do a Day 2 test, and they need the magic number to file the PLF, but they won’t be around in the UK for the result of the test to be of any relevance.
This scenario must play out in other countries too, for short term visits (typically a business trip).
I don’t think there is a way to have this as a single test to get around it as the only way you can get a PLF code is with a day 2 PCR test.
