Has anyone else been having issues with INIS recently?
I'm in N.Ireland (NI) and my wife is non-EEA but we applied for her naturalisation by marriage back in September.
I made certain we provided everything that was requested. Since her arrival in NI she had a family member of an EEA national residence card which had an expiry of last October. I checked and there is no legal obligation to extend this as it is just a proof of rights.
About 6 weeks ago, we got a letter from INIS asking to submit a copy of the current residence card within 28 days.
The helpline at INIS I found out was 'suspended' so I emailed them about not needing to renew the card etc, and provided further info and links. They said to disregard the 28 day limit as they had correspondence from us.
About 28 days later we got exactly the same letter, signed by someone else.
I emailed back to see what happened about our email, and they replied the same day:
"Please be advised that you are required to hold a current residence card
showing your permission to remain in Northern Ireland. Your previous
residence card expired on 14/10/2015. Please forward a copy of your current
card to this office."
I don't know if they even read the original email, so I replied with more detail points, and also asks where this requirement is as it isn't in any of the notes. My wife was required to provide proof of entitlement to live here in the years previous to the application and we provided that proof.
Plus she has an extra leave to remain stamp in her passport which they didn't seem to read or respond about as well.
Is something up at INIS, as they seem hard to contact, and don't seem to understand things before replying.
Would be keen to resolve this before any EU referendums in the UK start complicating things.
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