Dual national ETA

[ladycardamom]

Has anyone else noticed that dual nationals can't travel to the UK without a UK passport from Feb 26? Apparently the ETA app wont issue because it recognises you have British nationality, but to prove British Nationality at the airport you'll need a British passport. What a pain! I haven't had a UK passport for years!

Yep. I just had to stop procrastinating on getting my dd's British passport so we could go back for Christmas.

She's travelled to the UK on her US passport but we didn't want to risk being turned around. It was a ball ache with getting documents translated, but at least it's done now.

It just seems so ridiculous! I'm going as an Australian on holiday to UK for a couple of weeks but have to get a British passport now.

The passport office were very efficient, if that's any consolation to you.

I've kept both passports up to date and take both of them with me. Colossal bore, but needs must.

It's very annoying that its costs a dual/UK national more to enter the UK than a tourist!

I've been procrastinating getting my new passport photos done. Does anyone know if we need to photocopy the whole of our other passport for the application?

I actually thought it had always been like this. We almost fucked up a few years ago as we hadn’t got my kids U.K. passports yet and we were staying for months in the U.K. Didn’t even think about it as we had entered on Aus passports many times before, but at border control they were like “you can only stay for 6 months on this Australian passport so you MUST get them a British passport asap”. They were nice about it but it gave me a scare.

what they did tell us though was that you can bring an out of date passport and that will suffice as proof of citizenship but I don’t know if I’d want to rely on it.

An out of date passport will no longer suffice after Feb 26th. It seems quite clear a valid passport is essential. Pretty blimmin annoying tbh.

It’s ridiculous! Crazy to have to keep up a passport if you hardly ever use it.

Very annoying for families in particular! Does anyone know: my DH is a dual citizen (so will now need to renew his British passport, as well as get his Australian passport, as I think you must enter Aus on that as well), my DD was born in UK and will need to renew her British and Australian passports, but what about my Australian-born son? Would he be considered a British Citizen, even though he has never been? I am Australian and only have an Australian passport, but I'm wondering about whether my son will also need two passports? What an expensive palaver when we were finally considering our first trip back to the UK since we emigrated 11 years ago :-(

@FlorisApple as far as I know, yes. Your son is a British citizen and will need a British passport. We had to do the same thing for my dd, who was born in another country and had never been too.

I've been looking online and I think you have to register the Aus born child's dual citizenship by descent. There is an MN1 form to complete and a fee to pay. So surely if you havent done that they're not registered I'm thinking.

I’ve had this in reverse for 26 years with DD
Australia won’t let her enter the country on anything other than an Australian passport but then when she goes to leave she has to enter into the UK on a UK passport so it looks as though she never leaves Australia.

Hmm, thanks for this, I didn't even realise there was a form, I'll have to look into it properly then.

You can get the British passport without doing the MN1 form. You do have to send more documents when you're applying from abroad though. We needed to send the grandparents birth certificates and marriage certificate and our DD's US passport.

Edit to say the MN1 form is for children, who don't automatically qualify. Your child does qualify for British citizenship.

This is incorrect. Your child qualifies as a dual citizen too as their father is a british citizen, so it descends to your children (but cannot pass down any further for your Aussie born son). This is an automatic right, you don’t need to register this. There’s a lot of misinformation being spread about ETA for dual citizens.

I’ve been searching the internet but can’t get a solid answer to this question. I was born in the UK and emigrated to Australia when I was 10. I got an EEC passport when I was in my late teens, but it’s well expired now. I became an Australian citizen decades ago and have an Australian passport. I understand that I’ll need to get a UK passport in order to travel to England, and that my children are dual citizens by descent. However, do they absolutely need to get UK passports? How would anyone know that they are dual citizens?

If they were kiwi's they would need a UK passport to enter. Not sure about Oz.

NZ born automatic UK citizens

It's going to be tough for a lot of people who may not even be aware they are UK citizens. Nevermind trying to track down the documents they need.

Has anyone managed to get a UK passport recently? I posted our applications from NZ, at great cost, 13 days ago. The target delivery was 5 working days. They are still with DHL having waited forever in Auckand then touring 4 countries. I'm also waiting to renew my NZ passport which runs out in a few days - can't do that till this one is approved.

My renewal should have been straightforward and its been really stressful and expensive. Three passports has cost the best part of 1000 dollars and the parcel hasn't arrived yet! I really hope no one needs an interview as these could be in Wellington.

We got one a few months ago. The passport office were very efficient so hopefully once your application arrives it'll be speedy. It sounds like it's a DHL issue right now?

Yes, I think DHL have been overwhelmed by the volume of passport applications. Ours finally arrived on Thursday last week according to tracking. But our applications have not been updated on the passport office system. I'm worried they will also be overwhelmed.

Fingers crossed. I hate not having a passport.

Need to read more when I'm properly awake & caffjnated, but yes it's already causing a hassle for my 83yo mum.

Waiting for them to update the tracking to say they'd received the application was the longest part for us! And then it was just days until we had a new passport printed!

@Justlostmybagel that's very reassuring. Thank you.