American with visa entry to France. May he land in Belgium when coming to Europe for the first time?

Upvote:6

As described in the other answer and comments, a US citizen does not need a visa to visit France or any other Schengen country, provided they adhere to the following rules (from memory):

  • They intend to stay for less than 90 days
  • On any day they are in the Schengen Area, they have not spent more than 90 days out of the last 180 inside Schengen
  • They come for tourism, to visit friends or family, for business, and a number of other reasons which do not involve working while in the Schengen Area
  • They have the means to support themselves during their stay
  • They have the means to return home (or at least exit Schengen), usually taking the form of a return ticket
  • They have travel insurance for the duration of their stay
  • They are not considered dangerous or somehow undesirable.

Anyone coming under those conditions just needs their US passport and book a flight. Since one would not need a visa, one can enter the Schengen Area anywhere.

If your friend lives in the US but is not actually a US citizen, they may indeed need a visa. Such visas, while granted by one country, allow entry through any other country in the Schengen Area (of course if it doesn’t make any sense this may lead to issues, but entering via Belgium to get to France is not in this situation). One would still need to meet the requirements of the visa, including having a main purpose of stay/longest time spent in the country which issued the visa (you can’t get a visa from France and then just spend all your time in another country — at least on the first visit on that visa).

Likewise, if your friend has plans which go beyond a simple short stay (e.g. to take employment, for longer studies, to come live with someone…) then they do indeed need a visa, which would be a long-term national visa (type D). Those in general allow you to enter through anywhere in the Schengen Area as well, but again, one needs to follow the terms of the visa (there’s a lot of variety there).

So, in any case, with the exception of very specific and unusual circumstances, yes, they can enter via any Schengen country they want.

Upvote:22

It's very odd for an American to have a tourist visa for France. However, it's also true that people frequently use the term "tourist visa" to refer to the visa-free short stay that US citizens (and citizens of several other countries) are permitted under the Schengen regulations.

In general, though, anyone with a visa issued by any Schengen country can enter the Schengen area anywhere. You can find people saying that the first entry must be through the country that issued the visa, but this is entirely incorrect.

It's possible for the visa to be territorially restricted, in which case he must of course abide by those restrictions. These restrictions are unusual -- the regulation says that such visas are to be issued "exceptionally."

Some comments below are hinting at the possibility that this is a romance scam. We see these from time to time. It's possible that your question arises from the less-than-precise use of the term "visa" and that there's no need to be suspicious, but it's also possible that you're asking because someone is claiming some sort of false difficulty to gain your sympathy with the goal of taking advantage of you. From what you've told us, it's difficult to say for sure, but it deserves to be mentioned explicitly for safety's sake.

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