Dual nationals travelling to the UK

[tinydynamine]

A heads up for my fellow UK-other nationality dual nationals:
From the end of February, dual nationals travelling to the UK must use their UK passport when entering the UK. Since Brexit I have been using my German passport only. This will no longer be possible. I could be denied boarding at the airport. My son has only ever had a German passport. Through me he automatically has British citizenship which means he now also needs a British passport to the UK.

My understanding is that it is only if he was born in the uk, that he needs a uk passport. Please correct me if I’m wrong as my son is in the same position

My kids have joint South African British nationality. They have always travelled out of SA on that passport and into UK on their British. If they were to re enter SA on a British passport they would be limited to staying on a tourist visa. I had a friend who did so and it caused a huge headache. My understanding had always been that if you have dual nationality you must use that passport to enter and leave the country of the passport.

My kids were not born in the UK. I appreciate that dual nationality with an EU country may be different. For us it was important that they have both passports from birth to provide as many options as possible

The UK has always allowed you to enter under your other passport and now this is changing.

According to ChatGPT (I know, I know), he is a British citizen so needs a UK passport to travel to the UK.

British Citizens are not allowed to use the ETA system to enter the UK with a passport for another nationality. If you are a British Citizen living abroad you have to use your British passport to enter the U.K. If you don't have a current British Passport you have to get a Certificate of Entitlement which costs £589 🙄

It's a PITA, but I'm grateful to have dual nationality. When I renewed my UK passport, I had to declare my other nationality. My UK passport has my other passport's details in the notes section.

We have dual nationalties and have both passports since Brexit happened. I never thought of not having it.

I need my UK passport to prove my right to work in the UK and my German one to enter Germany/EU countries without any problems. I could have used the UK one until they started the stamping of passports but because we naturalised in 2019 we never not had a Germany one.

It is expensive and can be cumbersome but I never thought twice about it.

I have dual British and NZ citizenship. I am UK born but emigrated to NZ as a young child. DD automatically has both (NZ born but has held a UK passport in the past, which I applied for when we visited). I can’t see any reason for me to ever return to the UK so don’t plan to renew my passport, and would even consider renouncing citizenship in future. I imagine there are many in NZ and probably Australia too that feel the same way.

What would be the benefit of renouncing your British citizenship?

This sort of thing really. Just lots of paperwork to keep up on.

I have 3 passports and my kids will eventually (one nationality due to my birth and they won’t need it until we visit which won’t be any time soon). My husband has 2. We enter and leave each country on that passport as otherwise we are tourists and that gets complicated if you aren’t actually a tourist. It’s a total pain as we all have different expiry dates and the kids seem to come up constantly.

We are UK and American citizens - I know quite a few Americans who renounced for tax reasons as we have to file in both countries. We aren’t wealthy so it doesn’t matter but if you are it has implications.

Nope. My cousin has lived in Australia since she was a one year old baby. She's coming to the UK in May so is having to try to get a UK passport for the first time. She's taken advice and been told that her adult children, obviously born in Australia, will also need to get British passports should they come here.

Ok. I’m glad I posted. Thanks for the info

It’s all going to be a mess for duals/tris etc and people need to really pay attention to their passport expiry dates.

I work in this area. You won’t be refused at the UK border as you can’t be denied entry if you’re British. It’s the carrier you need to comply with. They will need to see you have an ETA or a GBR passport. They will be unlikely to budge on this.
Maintaining dual passports is a cost of dual nationality. It has been possible to manage without a GBR passport until now but now UK is moving to the same pre clearance model as many other countries.
Will be interesting to see if there is a rush to renounce citizenship.

It’s only £90 every decade to keep up your UK passport.

There’s been a lot of confusion amongst the dual British citizens in Australia. Essentially, you need to maintain a UK and Australian (or other country) passport to move freely between the two countries.

As @Beekmansaid, it’s £90 or so every decade. I’m happy to pay that if it means I can get home quickly if I need to or stay for an extended time if a family member is unwell.

Funny to see this thread as I just learnt about this from my best friend in NZ tonight.

It's all a bit batshit IMO. She hasn't had a British passport for over 30 years & used her NZ one to come here.

i'll make coffee & read the thread fully in the morning to see if anything anyone has posted makes this batshit nonsense seem reasonable, especially in light of the amount of illegal immigration...

Looking at the Government website, it seems to be ok to return to UK with an Irish passport doesn't it? My family have Irish and UK passports but I assume it is ok to go out and return on the Irish one without ETAs.

Better renew my British passport then.

Luckily my British born kids have Irish passports as well as their Australian ones. They have never needed or wanted British as they will never live there again but the Irish thing makes life so much easier, especially as most of our trips involve mainland Europe too. DH on the other hand now has to renew his British passport which he had no reason to do before. I think there will be a lot of pissed off people denied boarding by airlines - totally their fault for not keeping up to date with requirements but I feel sorry for the airline staff who will get the brunt of people’s annoyance.

DH has a British passport and a Greek Cypriot passport. Whenever we go to Cyprus he uses his British passport however at passport checks in Cyprus he’s always told he should use his Cypriot one. The intention was when he next goes was to use the Cypriot one however now reading this is seems it could cause issues.

He’ll just need both. If we go to the states we need all 8 passports - American for entering the states and British for coming home. For all other travel we use our British passports.

When booking flights though does it give you the option to enter different passport numbers for outbound and return legs?

Urgh just when I thought I couldn't hate Brexit anymore than I already did.

What are the advantages of keeping British citizenship (we all hold French passports)?

Yes just heard this too. We have dual nationality British/ Belgium. Just need to make sure British passports are always in date as otherwise can’t visit elderly mother/ family. Brexit really is the gift that keeps on giving 😩. We always present both passports at border control (there is now a big sign at Calais Eurotunnel instructing you to do this if dual nationals). otherwise your passport gets stamped unnecessarily.