ETA for the UK and dual citizenship

[helluvatime]

If I have understood correctly, you need to travel on your British passport to avoid having to get an ETA OR get a certificate of entitlement (which costs £550!!!) This seems very unfair to me and is particularly so for those of us who have dual nationality kids who want to travel home to see grandparents.

My kids actually do have UK passports now but did not get them for a long time as we are a relatively low income household and getting everyone two passports when not really needed was too much. I think a lot of people are going to be caught out this way! Oh for the pre-Brexit days when you could travel on a £15 ID card....

Anyway, is this right? Has anyone been turned back because they are a British citizen but without a passport?

I’m not sure I get it. We just travel into the UK on our British one and abroad use our other one?

Yes. That is fine if you have a UK passport. A lot of British citizens have not got UK passports due to the cost and they travel on the other ones. I could not have afforded UK passports for all of my kids when they were little and I was on mat leave.

The ETA is only about £15 though, and very easy to get.

Oh I get it. Yes but the ETA is as @CommissarySushi pointed out, very cheap, and valid for two years so this is a reasonable fix. This is life now and is not going to change. Brexit gonna Brexit.

No, you can’t get the ETA if you have British citizenship. Your application will be refused. Hence the problem. British citizens travelling on a foreign passport have to get a certificate of entitlement not an ETA - over £500 not £20 per person including children.

My DD has British citizenship but a US passport. We travelled to the UK with her on an ETA a couple of months back?

Apparently they are being a bit lenient at the moment as not everyone is aware but when the rules come in full force, that will not be possible.

Also, according to the rules you mustn’t apply for an ETA for a UK citizen.

Just get them British passports then. Don’t they need permanent residency in their foreign passport if you enter with those?
my kids only have UK passports for now (also dual nationals) it was faster and easier to get the passport of the country they live in!

Not everyone has the spare cash to get the second passport though. It can also be a long process and more difficult to get some passports - as you seem to have found out with your kids!

You need to factor the costs of passports into your travel.

I guess the lesson is that travel is expensive and to prioritise money for passports, if you want to travel to the UK.

Good to know about the new rules! I was being lazy by not applying for DD's British passport yet.

Yes that’s why I don’t understand why you didn’t get the ones of the country you live in!! I made a choice and got the ones of the UK for them as they were cheaper, easier and quicker and we live here. We can get ETAs for Europe now.
as you know these are the rules now, get the UK passport or don’t travel. Nobody here can change it for you.

Yes but I think this unfairly impacts dual national kids. It is one thing factoring in £20 per kid - quite another over £100 for a new passport. Bear in mind too that as overseas residents we have to apply directly to the UK now for passports (used to be done in local embassies) so we have to add steep courier fees on to that - and separate fees for each passport as they refuse to send more than one passport at once.

A kids passport is £60.
you also have a lot of benefits being a dual national that Brits don’t have. Stop complaining.

It does sting a bit, but I see being a dual-national as a privilege these days. Definitely worth jumping through the hoops.

I don't think the UK has anything like a database of citizens, so I would just lie about the British citizenship and travel as foreigners. It's even more expensive getting children's passports overseas by the time you've paid for all the required certificates and courier fees. They only laat 5 years too

You haven’t actually read what I wrote. My kids do now have both passports (Italian and English) but I know a lot of friends whose kids only have Italian passports and they are being told they also need to get UK passports.

I am just highlighting a situation as it seems a lot of people are not aware of this. Would you be happy if you were told that your kids cannot travel on the passport they have and they need to get the other one too? You said it was not easy to get....

£61.50 for a child’s UK passport. Best option.

My DC always had/have both.

The rules are the rules happiness is irrelevant.

if you want your kids to be treated exactly the same as UK citizens then you should have chosen for them to have UK passports rather than the one of their other nationality 🤷‍♀️

I did. Another person who didn’t read what I wrote.

sorry I misunderstood. I don’t know what the issue is, I am not happy with lots of Brexit rules but what can I do. I am not happy that all my EU friends and kids need passports to visit me now. And some won’t anymore.

My kids have UK passports and are also citizens of an EU country, we will get EU ETAs when the time comes.
These kids are still very privileged to be dual nationals and travel internationally.

Ah sorry, I didn’t realise having dual citizenship meant I was no longer entitled to complain about anything. 🙄 This is a chat board. I can express an opinion that this system sucks.

If the EU system is implemented like the UK has done, they won’t be able to get ETAs, they will have to get passports. That is the point.

unfairly impacts

Brexshit unfairly impacted a lot of things.