We are going to cross over into France next month for a holiday in our campervan and I will be taking some radio equipment. We will land in Brittany and the Mènez-Hom FL/NO-021 looks like an easy first summit to activate as we can stay overnight in the car park on the top.
Now for my question. The RSGB website says I need to have a copy of my license including Section 2 of the license and a copy of the regulations of the country I am in. The RSGB say I should contact the French Licensing Authority for this. But surely this must be available on line somewhere although if it is I haven’t found it. I have found a link to this website but I can’t find anything there.
Can anyone help - of course I suspect the chances of being asked to produce it are probably minimal but it would be nice to have my “papers” in order if I am asked.
Apart from knowing the CEPT condition that apply to you visiting a CEPT country why would you need to have the copy of the local regulations at hand? I guess that is relevant for non-CEPT countries?
And who would check that anyway?
For the usually latest information on CEPT conditions I can recommend Cept_Laenderliste.pdf
Looking at that table France seems not to have implemented the CEPT novice treaty so a full licence is required for visitors. But let’s hear what the locals have to add.
One of CEPT’s conditions is that you abide by the regulations that apply to someone holding the equivalent of your licence in the country you’re visiting. Mostly, I’d guess that comes down to knowing what power you can use on each band in the country concerned, but there’s always the chance that a particular country has some weird additional conditions a visitor might trip over (like those applying to use of 60 metres in the UK).
I take a printed copy of my licence and a printed copy of CEPT TR 61/01. It’s all I’ve needed when operating in EI, F, LX, PA, EA3, EA8, CT3, DL, OE, HB0, HB9, OK, SP and W6.
I’ve generally tried to find the country’s equivalent of the UK Full Licence Parameters table (listing frequencies, powers, etc.). Sometimes that’s not so easy, and I’ve relied on a bandplan that seems to capture most of the relevant information instead.
To make it extremely simple, France effectively applies the CEPT recognition rules concerning the equivalence of class 1 and class 2 radio operator certificates.
On the other hand, class 3 (novice) whose holders have a call sign F0xxx is not recognised.
That’s a very useful document as it has the band plans for all the different countries. I have printed off the pages for France and Spain - in case we get that far. Together with T/R 61-01 and my UK licence (which is a Full licence) I think that should be all I need. The Spanish page was interesting as it clears up what prefix to use there. You must use EA/ and the use of a district number such as EA2 is optional. I might use this if on SSB but on CW I might just stick with EA/ as it is easier to send!
Many thanks to everyone for all the comments and suggestions.
It’s good to see a compilation of these national regulators’ defined conditions and see that many are not the same as the IARU band plan at the end of the document.
It’s interesting to compare the differences even between neighbour countries within the EU on some bands!
For example: 30m in Germany (bandwidth/mode - max 800Hz) Austria (7 KHz) and the UK “Any Mode”.
As a Full Licence holder you should be able to d/load a HAREC from OfCom to accompany your UK Full Licence. The HAREC sets out what your UK Licence is comparable to whilst abroad.
Fyi, whilst I was in Italy, I only carried around two printed copies of both my UK Full Licence & the HAREC but looking back, having the T/R 61-01 also to hand makes sense.
If you go to EA you may use EA+district like @F5ODQ Alain which is often in the Pamplona area, it’s more interesting for your correspondents and not looking for a simplification in CW or SSB, I don’t see any interest in it (just program your memories on your keyer).
In France F/ it’s only thing you can use, the SOTA reference will do the rest, like everywhere else.
I wish you a good stay and I hope to contact you
73, Éric
PS: Look for parking spaces for your camper van, because these are vehicles that are less and less tolerated in many towns
Éric, thank you, we have visited France before but I agree the number of low cost or free aires de camping-cars in towns and villages has reduced. Many have been taken over by this company but we have their card and can use their locations - but it costs more money!
Precisely if you do not want to incur additional costs (for the summits) I think André @F5UKL can help you, on the other hand for parking in the cities it is very hard to be close to the city centers without $
(just program your memories on your keyer).