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I have visited a lawyer here in the UK to ask if I need any documents or letters as I am underage. Other than booking with an airline that accepts children travelling alone. And he said that he can provide me a permission letter from my mom to leave the UK. But the question that I would like to ask is that would I face any problems in the German airport on my way back? And would I need any other documents other than the permission letter?

I am going there to visit my aunt. And yes I did put this question to the lawyer but he said that i need a permission letter to leave the UK. However he isn't sure about the rules in the German airport on the way back.

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    Are you planning on meeting someone in Germany or going by yourself? Many hotels won't be particularly keen on renting rooms to an unaccompanied 14 year old, so that could be an issue. – Zach Lipton Aug 1 '16 at 18:53
  • Is this only about navigating the airport (presumably immigration) or about being abroad as a minor ? – blackbird Aug 1 '16 at 19:03
  • Whatever documents you use to travel to Germany ought to suffice for you to travel home from Germany. You will be dealing with the same airline, and you will be dealing with the same German passport control office. – phoog Aug 1 '16 at 20:00
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    I know one teenager who does this twice a month by himself since he was twelve with just his German ID card. (He lives with his mother in Frankfurt but often comes to visit his father in England for the weekend and in the school holidays.) He refuses to carry any special papers as he finds it undignified. It's hard to say that you will definitely have no problems, but your situation is not unusual. Make sure you know exactly where you are going when you leave the airport, and where you will meet your family. Border control look for kids who are being abducted by strangers or by fleeing parents – Calchas Aug 1 '16 at 21:46
  • Interrail, night trains, and youth hostels are your friends. – gerrit Aug 2 '16 at 10:09
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Some twenty years ago, when I was under 10 years old, my parents lived in England with me but all our family was in Germany. I can remember two distinct instances of flying alone, LHR–FRA and LHR–TXL.

As far as I can remember, there was nothing special except that as an unaccompanied minor I got a person from the airline who accompanied me from where my parents checked in my bags to the aeroplane and the same thing from arriving at the gate to where my relatives were able to pick me up after luggage reclaim. (And vice-versa for the way back.) To be honest, I don’t know if there was any hidden paperwork involved that I wouldn’t have seen.

The documents I had with me were my ID (back in the day Germany had a Kinderausweis which has since been replaced by a child’s passport) and my carte jaune (‘just in case’).

They didn’t check everything, by the way. On the trip to FRA, I had a tennis racket with me that was in the suitcase outbound but checked in separately inbound. I totally forgot about it until I was back at home, so my father had to drive back to the airport to reclaim it. It went unnoticed by the people who accompanied me.

Bear in mind that my experience is from the mid-nineties. Things may have changed.

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