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My original itinerary was to go to Prague and Munich (5 and 2 nights respectively). After I got my Schengen visa to Czech republic, I decided to add Austria (2 nights in Salzburg). Consequently, I changed the hotel and number of nights in Prague to:

  • 4 nights in Prague
  • 2 nights in Salzburg
  • 1 night in Munich

After I did that, I received a call from the embassy asking me why I changed the destination and the hotels and what not, and that they needed new confirmations. The following day they revoked my visa because I changed the hotel without telling them. Now that was totally new to me. Is this something embassies normally do?

There was a million proofs that Prague was my main destination and that indeed I am coming back to my country (I am leaving my 3-year-old home) and yet they were not convinced.

More importantly:

  • Will I be blacklisted from visiting the Schengen area altogether because of this?
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    Some eastern European countries seem to do that a lot (we've seen a few similar stories over years), though it's usually about an outright cancellation of the stay in the country which issued the visa, or a significant change to the number of nights which result in the issuing country no longer being the main destination. Did you provide the new itinerary + hotel confirmations when they requested them? That seems a bit extreme in your case.
    – jcaron
    Commented May 22 at 12:45
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    IMO this is yet another reason to never get your visa from a Czech consulate. They're not just stingy about hotel reservations, they're also only 47% likely to grant you a proper multi-entry visa. Germany is the most tourist-friendly consulate at the moment.
    – JonathanReez ♦
    Commented May 22 at 13:03
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    @jcaron I did send them an email with all the confirmation from booking.com. Not only that, but all my reservations and bookings were NON refundable.
    – Hussein Hammoud
    Commented May 22 at 13:17
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    @JonathanReez but they probably have a lower revenue threshold given the lower cost of life, and probably get more requests for this reason (people actually visiting CZ rather than other European countries because it's cheaper as well as people visa-shopping and using CZ because it's supposedly easier if they have low revenues). It could be interesting to compare the overall accept rate (too lazy to go check), but without more information about the quality of the applications their respectively receive I'm not sure that's very relevant.
    – jcaron
    Commented May 22 at 13:41
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    @jcaron I've seen Indian Green Card holders making $500k/year (so, 20x the median Czech salary) who own a $2M home get a meager single-entry 7-day Schengen visa when applying in the US. Some consulates are just more unreasonable than others.
    – JonathanReez ♦
    Commented May 22 at 14:06

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Now that was totally new to me. Is this something embassies normally do?

No and I personally consider it an abuse of the process but it does happen. Not many countries would collect and transfer data from hotels for the purpose of tracking visa holders in the first place but that's not the first time I hear about the Czech Republic doing that. So unfortunately the best advice we can give you is to be mindful of that, especially with Central European countries.

Will I be blacklisted from visiting the Schengen area altogether because of this?

You shouldn't be, but who knows? This would require additional action from the Czech Republic and you should be informed of it. The cancellation will however be recorded (IIRC for 5 years) and shared with all Schengen countries. It is likely to prompt additional scrutiny the next time you apply for a visa but does not in and of itself entail any automatic rejection.

As jcaron already alluded to, there are two different kinds of cancellation and an “annulment” is worse for you than a “revocation” as the former implies malice on your part. Revocation is merely a technical measure.

Formally, you still have the right to:

  • Appeal the decision
  • Request any info about you in the SIS (which would include an alert if you have been banned)

Neither of these are particularly easy so I am not convinced they are advisable at this point. Obviously, applying for another Schengen visa would reveal if you are banned.

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