Waterloo

Cheers for all the responses greatly appreciated

A thread last December seems to confirm that the child should not have a problem.

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/879580-child-returning-to-thailand-with-expired-passport/

You might need a notarized consent letter from the missing parent for the Thai passport. Not sure if this applies to renewals.

- Both parents can accompany the child to apply for an e-Passport and sign the parental consent form.

or

- One parent must accompany the child to apply for an e-Passport. The other parent can appear and sign the parental consent form when he/she picks-up the e-Passport.

or

- One parent must accompany the child, signs the parental consent form, and submits a notarized consent letter of the non-appearing parent.

http://www.mfa.go.th/main/en/services/1415/21479-Requirements-for-the-Ordinary-e-Passports-Applicat.html

Cheers can't get the second link to work at the moment but I think the problem is this end will try again latter with another computer.

Hi Guys

The wife will be taking our 2 children (2 & 5) to visit her mother for 7 weeks leaving in early July, both the children have Thai and UK passports.

Unfortunately the five year olds passport will expire this month.

Now we have an appointment at the Thai embassy next week to apply for a new one and we will be comfortably inside the 8 weeks they quote for processing, but I was wondering if it would not be easier to apply for the new one whilst she is in Thailand.

I have often read on here that you will be allowed to enter a country on an expired passport if your expired passport proves you are a national of that country and the five year olds UK passport is up to date so no problem getting on the plane.

Can anyone see a problem with this, I will not be travelling out with them as I have to stay home for work reasons ,when we applied for his first passport in London they did insist both parents were present?

Obviously she could always get an extension in his UK passport, or do a visa run being close to the Cambodia border.

sounds like ignorance on the part of the employer, I know of lots of people including my own wife who legally worked whilst on ILR

Shocking increase, I thought the system was already self financing with regard to visa's, I guess they want the visa fees to pay for all functions including border officers and enforcement!

Cheers

Hi has anyone applied for there partners first UK passport recently?

In section 4 of the form under parents details it states that if both parents were born outside the country that you must then fill in section 8 giving the grandparents details, now clearly this is so that they can determine if the applicant is entitled to a British passport through decent.

The Wife received her Naturalization certificate in June and we have put the relevant details in section 5 so surely her grandparents details are irrelevant?

I can't find anywhere in the guidance notes that under these circumstances that there is no need to file in section 8

any thoughts guys?

My wife and children have just been given citizenship. Just got the good news through, on 24th September.

Ceremony planned for next Tuesday.

Congratulations, hope you enjoy the day as much as we did.

Thanks fbf. Hadn't considered starting an FLR file quite so soon, was just going to relax for a year or 2 without thinking of any more visa applications!

Sounds like you've got things very well organised, I'll try to do the same. I'm flying out the last week of October and we will return to the UK the following week, so not long now.

This is good advice we didn't do it and were left scrabbling around when the time came

The main benefit is not having to deal with the Home Office or UKVI because you are no longer subject to immigration control. That has to be a massive, massive benefit!

It is not easy to pass, could be much better (even useful) but it is what it is! It is equally 'unfair' to all non-EU nationals but this type of test is common elsewhere in the world.

I would say priceless.

Yes the system can be difficult and frustrating, it certainly is expensive, but I for one sleep better now in the thought that no matter how they change the rules in the future my family's future together is secure.

Added the Wife to the electoral role last week, and our little boy started primary school this week, he looked very smart in his uniform.

Just checked my posts we applied 25th March 2015 received the good news on the 7th May 2015 and citizenship was on the 2nd June 2015

That was very quick. They seemed to have slowed down a bit

Good Luck it's a stressful time

Just to say we really enjoyed the Wife's citizenship ceremony, Newbury council made a real effort.

There was a not very flattering inspection of the naturalisation process - http://icinspector.independent.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Nationality-Report-web.pdf

• referees were never contacted to verify that they had agreed to act as a referee, to determine their suitability, or to check that they had sufficient knowledge of the applicant; and • checks were not conducted to determine if referees had been convicted of an imprisonable offence in the last ten years, despite the guidance to applicants indicating that such an individual would not be accepted as a referee.

This was 2014 so it would be nice to think something has happened since to change things. Becoming British is a big event and care should be taken to make sure the right people are approved and the wrong ones refused.

It was also suggested that:

We recommend that the Home Office: Performs random police checks for referees and takes appropriate action where the random 5% referee check on British citizens identifies inconsistencies with the information held by Her Majesty’s Passport Office.

It was also stated that meeting the six month target:

4.89 While this was a good performance, we noted that the six-month target did not appear to be very challenging.

Straying off topic somewhat but asking referees if they have been contacted is unlikely to be much of an indicator of the stage of processing.

Cheers Bob

Just read the section on Referees, pretty well confirms my suspicions.

anecdotally it is my belief Referees are rarely contacted, non of the Wife's referees were ever contacted from when she first entered the country on a student visa till the end of the process when she became a citizen.

During that time there were 2 student visa's, 2 Flr's 1 ILR 1 Citizenship on top of which I have also acted as a referee on a number of passport applications and have never heard a pep!

I'm curious as to how often Referee's are actually contacted, non of ours were throughout the whole process?

Just checked my posts we applied 25th March 2015 received the good news on the 7th May 2015 and citizenship was on the 2nd June 2015

The Wife had her Citizenship Ceremony only a couple of months ago and I am pretty sure from memory that we waited 6 weeks before hearing the good news

Toby & Layla on holiday in Switzerland last week

7by7 - If you read Jay's second link Cameron says

"We’ve already introduced a “deport first; appeal later” rule for foreign criminals claiming a so-called right to family life. It means if you’ve committed a crime and you’re not meant to be here, you have to go home before you can appeal. Next we will extend that to all immigration appeals, except asylum cases."

I think that is pretty clear that it includes foreign spouses. So if they introduce B1 for FLR we might well see instant deportations for relatively minor immigration problems. I hope it doesn't come to that.

That was the impression I got on the way it was being reported yesterday, a shocking development if it comes to that!

The devil will be in the detail.

Deport first appeal later for all cases except asylum is of particular concern with regard to foreign spouses and partners.

Seizing the wages of illegal workers is a headline grabber but I think means very little in practice. I think the vast majority of illegal workers send their money back home when they get it through numerous "corner shop" money transfer offices.

I would go one further and say that seizing of wages is a complete nonsense and they know it, Theresa May virtually admitted as much yesterday.

As you say in the majority of cases there will be no money to seize and just look at how successful they have been in seizing money from the mister big's.

just getting ready to make the Wife's first application as well, I agree with your understanding of the situation and suspect that 7by7 is correct that the person in question hasn't done one of these applications before

Officially, all first time adult British passport applicants* are supposed to attend an interview. My wife did when she applied for her first British passport over 10 years ago.

But this is not the first time I have heard of people not having to attend one; so maybe in practice it's random?

Or perhaps they had a period of not interviewing when they had that huge backlog of applications to clear?

Anyway, the interview is quite painless and is intended to prevent fraud and identity theft.

4. Your passport interview

You’ll be asked to confirm facts about yourself that someone trying to steal your identity may not know.

* Unless born on or before 2 September 1929.

It would be interesting to know if those who were not called all had bio metric residence cards already!

As the process is probably identical it could be argued that this is a duplication of the process.

* Unless born on or before 2 September 1929.

LOL.

yes I read that also

Cheers for the response, not worried at all just curious about the sister in laws comments and whether it was going to amount to the usual misinformation!

Hi we will shortly be applying for the wife's first UK passport and we are aware that for some years now it has been necessary to attend an interview on the application for a first adult passport.

However the Wife's sister was round last night and she claimed that 2 of her friends (Thai) who had applied last year for there first UK passports had not been called for interviews!

I was initially very dismissive and did not believe her, but it got me thinking that the interview is probably the same process as for a bio-metric residence card so do they accept this in lieu of an interview?

I've had a good look on the government website and can find nothing to support this theory, anyone got any recent experience or knowledge on this subject?

Good to hear.

I assume the visa was free (as it should be)?

What about documentation (marital papers + ID of both you + indication from you that she joins you to Switserland should be enough)?

Is there an option to have the passport sent by courier?

Edit: Where are my manners?! Enjoy your holiday!

Yes no charge from the Embassy although I did think the website try's to push you towards using the services of VFS global.

I would not be surprised if some individuals go to VFS instead of directly to the Embassy, not an issue if you live a long way from London and one of VFS other offices is closer for the individual.

Downloaded the form directly from the website and supplied the following documentation.

Wife's passport

My passport

our British marriage certificate

our BA flight reservations

A letter of invitation from the Friends we will be staying with, although they did not require this last document from us the Wife did get the impression that other people were asked for it.

Strictly speaking the form said you didn't need the invite but the website did suggest it would be preferred (I think it's a good idea to have it)

We didn't asked about courier options, you would hope this is an option but as I work in London it was easy for me to pop in and collect it for free.

Last time we need to do this the Wife becomes a British Citizen on the 2nd of June.