The UK Border Agency offers you the opportunity to find out what they know about you, by a so-called Subject Access Request (SAR), for the bargain price of £10. I was just too curious to resist…
And about a month after sending my request, I got a big envelope with lots of papers in it. There were all the forms I sent them, all the letters where we haggled about when I would send them my passport, and some screenshots of a Windows-based database application showing pretty much the same information I wrote in the forms, and my photo.
I must say that I expected them to send records of every time I entered or left the UK, so I'm a bit disappointed. (Are my travel habits so boring to them?) It would have been rather convenient, to have an authoritative place to look up in what country I was at a certain date. I guess I should be happy that their surveillance is limited…