Has anyone "imported" a non-British child into the UK?

[ManhattanMama]

Has anyone had a child overseas and then brought them to live in the UK?

DH and I are both British, but have a DS who has an American passport. We're coming back to live in the UK in a couple of months and I can't work out what I need to do for him - does he need a British passport/visa to live in the UK permanently?

I've been told that immigration at the airport won't be happy about letting him in on a US passport permanently which I can understand.

Also, when he had to visit the doctors in the UK during a holiday earlier this year, we had to pay for him to go private, as he wasn't allowed NHS treatment - obviously we don't want that to be the case permanently!

Any tips would be gratefully received. I have called the British consulate in New York, but they wanted me to call a premium rate line to get the information!

ooh
well and truly corrected

both kids are dual - american and british.

my children are dual as well - American and British and so am i.

oooh expat if your a sahm you'd better get DH to transfer the cb into your name. it covers you for any shortfall in ni cotributions because you are the main carer. just for pension etc purposes. the tax office reccomended this as i have ILTR. it only take a call for the cb office to send out the forms and a letter from DH to say he's happy to transfer it over. once i had my ni no i never had any trouble when i had to claim job seekers for a short while. incidentally my DCs qualify for british/irish/japanese.....

it's been changed! dd2 was always under my name for CB.

it's been changed! dd2 was always under my name for CB.

all the paperwork is such pain isn't it! i think i'll apply for a british passport when mine runs out. am loath to pay for the ILTR stamp when i get new passport......

especially because it's like £150 for them to put it in the new passort.

i got citizenship back when it was like £270 to apply, but now they jacked it up to like £700.

i can't remember what my UK passport cost.

was just sooooo sick of filling out paperwork, especially with two dual national DDs.

i need to renew DD1's American passport here like yesterday, it expires at teh end of August.

ever get the feeling it's a huge scam?? the prices i mean.....

expat, we were at the US Embassy yesterday getting DSs citizenship and passport, and you'll be pleased to hear that it was $150.00, not pounds, and with good exchange rate = £75.00.

British passport for DS was £57.00, but this included secure delivery as they needed to see my US passport.

thanks, ilove!

i think it was only $90 5 years ago when i got her birth certificate, SSN card and 1st passport.

she can get her renewal passport by post, BUT have to go through to glasgow to get the photo done.

wehn the girls got their UK passports, their dad was able to use check and send with his UK passport, so it wasn't too bad.

i really can't remember how much i paid for UK one - it's one of the new biometric ones.

guess should pay attention, as DH needs to renew his next year.

expat - if you have a digital camera, photobox (co.uk?) have the facilities so you upload the photo and they do the US dimensions.

Hope that saves you a trip?

thanks, ilove!

i'll check it out, because it was save an entire days' travelling and about £30 - it costs about £20 for me to get into Glasgow with DD1.

Expat, any any other Americans (British or Irish) needing passport photos, this is from the photobox.co.uk web site:

Click on the image you want to order and then it will bring up the change size screen, scroll down to passport photos and then click in the second screen to choose either UK/Irish or USA.

He will be entitled to a British passport as his parents are british.

I came to live in the UK a number of years ago now and I got a British passport because my father was British. A few years ago they changed the laws and you are able to claim if either your mother or father were British. Originally you were entitled to right of abode if your mother was british but passport and the citizenship that comes with it if your father was british.

Another one who says - just get him the passport. Made life a lot easier for me when I went to live and work in the UK. ( am an aussie by birth).

I don't get your problem? Just get the passport. We had a similar situation but the other way. Got our DD her Australian passport first as we were going to Oz on holiday just after she was born here in UK.

When we re-entered UK immigration wanted to know on what grounds she was entering the country...I never thought that far ahead! duh! They let us through though(I can not imagine they would detain you) and we went and sorted out UK passport before we went on anymore abroad holidays!.

We paid a bit more and got a fast track one within 10 days. Was not too difficult.

I agree, just get it done and don't bother with ILR etc. I have that and if I leave the country for any length of time (Either 2 or 4 years) I lose it.

My kids have triple citizenship: British American and Italian. However, I ahve only bothered to get actual passports for US and GB. I am italian/American and my dh is British and kids were born in UK. Anyway, it doesn't matter where they were born...because dh is British, they are British. As everyone else has said....just get a UK passport...do it expedited if you need to. It's very straightforward. When you leave USA check into flight with your US passport. When you arrive in UK go through passport control with UK passport. When you leave UK, check into flight with US passport. When you arrive in USA use US passport. I have occasionally been asked to show both...it's totally acceptable and really not questioned by anyone (except the Italians who LOVE the fact that my ds who has a very classic Italian first name, is traveling on a British passport and has a classic British last name).
British are very very fussy about the passport photo (no smiling allowed as it may disguise your features or somesuch!!??). I always do mine with a digital camera and cut it out with a sharp blade to the exact size. Americans are a little less fussy and the Italians are happy as long as it fits somewhere onto the passport (they attach it in the embassy with a glorified gluestick).

Oh, and as British Citizens they are entitled to all the various benefits. In our case, the biggest hassle was that I had to get a National Insurance number in order to receive the CB.

Think I may know where the confusion lies.

There isn't a piece of paper that says, 'you are a citizen of country x...'

The easiest thing to do is to find out from the British Embassy re: passport. The UK passport requirements are quite straightforward.

The only other thing is that when your DS goes to the US he must travel on his US passport. I don't know why. Nor do I know how the US authorities would know one way or the other, but that's what I was told by the US Embassy here in London.

When we travel in the EU, the kids use their British passports and when we go to the US, use their US ones.

Oh, and the great thing is that you can choose which immigration line!!

You can register him as a British National born abroad, and get him a UK birth certificate. With this you can get him a UK passport, no quibbles. Contact your consulate or embassy, they will be able to advise. We've done exactly that for ds from Spain

Thanks everybody - looks like I'm headed to get him a British passport!