Foreign Birth Registration

[Mr_Knight]

Fortunately for me, I was able to get my parent's ID from a sibling, but I did see 2 other posts, 1 might be useful, the other a bit more discouraging.

1st Post:ireland/foreign-birth-registration-t277 ... l#p2031199
My application was not complete. I was missing my dads if as we are estranged. I had to send over his siblings birth and death certificate and things went quickly then.

Looks like Countrychicken was approved, so evidently it worked.

Less encouraging - expensive & difficult
[/url]ireland/foreign-birth-registration-t277 ... l#p1837778[/url]

Good Luck

I did webchat early 2020 with the FBR department (because I knew I wouldnt be able to get my mothers ID without starting WW3) & they said I should still make the application & just add a cover letter. I will be pretty angry if they then respond negativly 2023/2024 when they could have been clear early 2020 to not bother applying.

[Valo]

Fortunately for me, I was able to get my parent's ID from a sibling, but I did see 2 other posts, 1 might be useful, the other a bit more discouraging.

1st Post:ireland/foreign-birth-registration-t277 ... l#p2031199
My application was not complete. I was missing my dads if as we are estranged. I had to send over his siblings birth and death certificate and things went quickly then.

Looks like Countrychicken was approved, so evidently it worked.

Less encouraging - expensive & difficult
[/url]ireland/foreign-birth-registration-t277 ... l#p1837778[/url]

Good Luck

I did webchat early 2020 with the FBR department (because I knew I wouldnt be able to get my mothers ID without starting WW3) & they said I should still make the application & just add a cover letter. I will be pretty angry if they then respond negativly 2023/2024 when they could have been clear early 2020 to not bother applying.

Tbh, I imagine it'll be fine. I've heard of these exact predicaments before through talking to various people recently and they succeeded. I have also seen a few people here talk about half complete applications and they also succeeded.

[Valo]

Fortunately for me, I was able to get my parent's ID from a sibling, but I did see 2 other posts, 1 might be useful, the other a bit more discouraging.

1st Post:ireland/foreign-birth-registration-t277 ... l#p2031199
My application was not complete. I was missing my dads if as we are estranged. I had to send over his siblings birth and death certificate and things went quickly then.

Looks like Countrychicken was approved, so evidently it worked.

Less encouraging - expensive & difficult
[/url]ireland/foreign-birth-registration-t277 ... l#p1837778[/url]

Good Luck

I did webchat early 2020 with the FBR department (because I knew I wouldnt be able to get my mothers ID without starting WW3) & they said I should still make the application & just add a cover letter. I will be pretty angry if they then respond negativly 2023/2024 when they could have been clear early 2020 to not bother applying.

Also, if you applied in early 2020 then you are almost at the 2 year mark, so you should be near the end I imagine. Do let me know how you get on btw. I'm in the same situation.

[Mr_Knight]

Also, if you applied in early 2020 then you are almost at the 2 year mark, so you should be near the end I imagine. Do let me know how you get on btw. I'm in the same situation.

2020 was when I was just getting all the certificates together. I had initially thought that "original birth certificate" meant the literal original one from when I was born I didnt realise you could just order another one lol. A document I knew I would not be able to get from my mother or a state ID. So I delayed even bothering applying for years until the FBR department said I should when I enquired. Its quite a potential rigmarole. You are right about it almost seems like as adults we need permission from out estranged parents to apply for citizenship. Its quite strange.

[Valo]

Also, if you applied in early 2020 then you are almost at the 2 year mark, so you should be near the end I imagine. Do let me know how you get on btw. I'm in the same situation.

2020 was when I was just getting all the certificates together. I had initially thought that "original birth certificate" meant the literal original one from when I was born I didnt realise you could just order another one lol. A document I knew I would not be able to get from my mother or a state ID. So I delayed even bothering applying for years until the FBR department said I should when I enquired. Its quite a potential rigmarole. You are right about it almost seems like as adults we need permission from out estranged parents to apply for citizenship. Its quite strange.

Yeah, it is quite ridiculous and that's why I find it hard to believe they'd just bluntly reject you, especially if the FBR team is literally telling people to go ahead anyway even if they don't have state ID for a parent. Like my childhood was pretty tumultuous in the sense that I was in foster care for 4 years and then permanently estranged from my mother from the age of 10. It would be somewhat discriminatory to just reject estranged people outright when clearly the circumstances of their childhood are outwith their control. I find it hard to believe that they have rejected every single estranged applicant who has ever tried to get onto the FBR

But as I say, I have seen a few people in the exact same situation as we have success and now have their Irish passports. I was reading a Guardian article (https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyl ... itizenship) and in this article the woman in question is estranged from her mother and thus cannot obtain her state ID for the FBR application. One of the comments on the article is from a person who had the exact same problem, and they said that they were just to provide a cover letter explaining the situation. They got accepted and now have an Irish passport.

So people have succeeded in the exact same situation as us.

[Dalton_Trumbo]

I got tired/bored of waiting, so dropped off the application for my son with the USPS today. They said it would take 5-6 business days to get from the United States to Ireland.

Application submitted: April 13th, 2021

I am hoping that this entire process (including Irish passport) is completed before 2024 (i.e. by December 31st, 2023), but given how backlogged they are I'm not holding my breath. Fingers crossed though!

Hi all,

As I mentioned before, I submitted my son's completed application on April 13th, 2021. USPS tracking service confirmed receipt in Ireland on April 26th, 2021. I've heard nothing since then (not even a confirmation email/notification from the Irish authorities confirming receipt), but that was to be expected since everything was shut down.

I was thrilled to hear that FBR processing resumed last week. I was hoping to contact the FBR office to confirm receipt of documents since all I have is the American confirmation of delivery, no Irish confirmation. Alas, the webchat does not appear to ever be active and when I call by phone it says that they're busy and unable to answer calls at this time.

Any advice on contacting FBR? Should I just stay put and not bother them? On the one hand we're not in that much of a hurry: my wife already has an Irish passport and my son is 10 months old. On the other hand, it has been almost 7 months with no information whatsoever from the Irish authorities.

As an amusing aside regarding other countries, our friends had a daughter just a few months before the birth of our son here in the US. The husband is a US citizen and the wife is a US/French citizen. Their daughter not only was registered as a French citizen prior to her 1st birthday, but also already has a French passport. This is an analogous situation to the FBR since that US/French wife was herself born in the US, making the daughter the second generation to be born in the US. Somehow the French were able to process everything very quickly even with COVID issues. I still don't get why the Irish have such a difficult time processing citizenship in a timely manner.

That is interesting re: the French citizenship/passport! Though I would say, keep in mind that France has almost 70 million people and Ireland is less than 5, they have much less resources than a country the size of France. Which is not to say Ireland hasn't bottled this, they certainly have.

Wouldn't say they have bottled it per se, I don't think the FBR was ever designed with this many applications in mind. The current backlog is 31,000 and this is primarily a result of Brexit that has only been exacerbated by COVID. Prior to Brexit Irish citizenship applications via FBR were nowhere near that level, so it's hard to blame them given this isn't something Ireland asked for.

All of that is true, and understandable, but at the very least the didn't communicate at all with people who had applied pre-pandemic, no updates, no method of communication with them really whatsoever.
If they had communicated better the status, I'd have been fine to wait it out as we all are.
Communication is free. Especially to people who applied to something which is expensive and extremely time consuming often to do.
Anyway, just a bit of a rant. Glad things seem to be moving now!

[HPFA]

Hi People

Good to know that things have reopened.

I sent off documents for my daughter in December 2020 - the office shut down when they were in the post so presumably they've been held somewhere. I know they don't send confirmation of receipt although I've kept the proof of delivery.

My question is - do people think the two years counts from the application or from now. Can I hope for this to be sorted out by the end of 2022 or 2023.

It's my fault anyway - I dithered about it for ages - maybe I couldn't really believe we would do something so stupid in the UK. She could have had her Irish passport by now.

[itsphili]

Hi,

Im looking to apply through the FBR as I have a grandparent who is Irish. This makes my mum an automatic Irish Citizen. When applying I select Foreign Birth Register and the grandparents field gets greyed out. Then I have to add my mums FBR registration number which she doesn't have? How do I get this number or is there a workaround or am I doing something wrong?

Thanks in advance!

[itsphili]

Hi,

Im looking to apply through the FBR as I have a grandparent who is Irish. This makes my mum an automatic Irish Citizen. When applying I select Foreign Birth Register and the grandparents field gets greyed out. Then I have to add my mums FBR registration number which she doesn't have? How do I get this number or is there a workaround or am I doing something wrong?

Thanks in advance!

[Suro]

Hi,

Im looking to apply through the FBR as I have a grandparent who is Irish. This makes my mum an automatic Irish Citizen. When applying I select Foreign Birth Register and the grandparents field gets greyed out. Then I have to add my mums FBR registration number which she doesn't have? How do I get this number or is there a workaround or am I doing something wrong?

Thanks in advance!

Notice on page one of the FBR application = "Please indicate the citizenship category to which the applicant’s parent belongs
Important: Please note that this question relates to how the PARENT acquired Irish citizenship"

So for you, you need to click "Born abroad to a parent born in Ireland" and not FBR for your parent.

I hope that helps (I made the same mistake initially lol and was very confused too )

[Valo]

Thank you all it’s a relief. I left it for about 18 months and phoned December 20 to be told it was on the pile next to do. I then tried several web chats and go no where.

I was so angry come July this year when it had been over 2 years. So I emailed the passport email address with all my dates and communication. A week later I had a phone call.

My application was not complete. I was missing my dads if as we are estranged. I had to send over his siblings birth and death certificate and things went quickly then.

I think they are processing all the ones they can that are straight forward and any that are incomplete or complicated leaving until some of the backlog is sorted.

So, this has just given me an idea.....

Seeing as I'm in the exact situation and can't provide my mother's state ID, I was wondering if it would be a good idea to provide the birth certificate and state ID of her brother? I and him are still in contact as most of our family have disowned her because of the way she treated me in childhood. I already have a cover letter along with an affidavit explaining the estrangement, so I was wondering if perhaps providing this for her brother might at least help me that little bit more and show that I'm genuinely linked with her?

Really, I just want to give myself the best possible chance of success.

[Muscat]

In regard to the comments about the ease of obtaining a French passport or CNF (certificate of French Nationality)…

it is certainly easy to register the child of a French citizen when they are minors. Unfortunately for us we did not do this (my husband, who died recently, was a French citizen from birth) and by the time of the Brexit referendum our daughters were in their 20s. We have had to produce mountains of evidence going back as far as the marriage of their French great-grandparents, and proof that my French mother-in-law, and my husband, never acquired British nationality (however my husband was born a dual French/British national as his Jewish father was naturalised British after having been evacuated from Prague just before WWII). We are 5 years on, and still no CNF.

My experience is that anything outside the norm with the French authorities is extremely slow and tedious and processed by rude, lazy civil ‘servants’. I have permanent residency here in France (after something of a battle, and helped by the IOM) but I’m thoroughly sick of the bureaucracy here, and so I’m starting to move my life back to the uk, now that I am alone.

To me, the FBR route as an adult is significantly quicker, cheaper and less frustrating than my daughters’ struggle to acquire proof of their French nationality.

[Celtic67]

Good luck everyone, I received my congratulations email onto my passport now
Application 4oct19
Documents received 14oct19
Address confirmation 16Nov21
Congratulations email 25Nov21

[Dalton_Trumbo]

Good luck everyone, I received my congratulations email onto my passport now
Application 4oct19
Documents received 14oct19
Address confirmation 16Nov21
Congratulations email 25Nov21

Congrats! So just over 2 years. Question, do you need to send back the actual FBR certificate to apply for a passport, or just the number or such? I mean if you're in the register they should be able to confirm that without sending the actual paper I would think?
If not, they should offer some sort of combo thing, where they keep your documentation and use it towards the passport, then send everything back to you. Sending it back and forth seems unnecessary. shrug.

[yapmaul]

Hi all, I have gathered all the documents I need for my application (and more!) but I find some things about the online application form confusing, especially to do with the requirement for marriage certificates for all generations "IF APPLICABLE". I am widowed, so presumably I select 'single' on the dropdown menu, but do I need to send in my marriage certificate and my late wife's death certificate? Then there is my late father. I assume I put him down as 'married' but do I need to send his marriage certificate as it doesn't involve a name change? The same question applies to my Irish-born grandfather. Final question - I have a neighbour who is a police officer and a friend who's a GP but I don't think either of them have rubber stamps or business cards. Is it safest to pay a solicitor to do the witnessing etc? Cheers and thanks in advance to anyone who can help.

[Mr_Knight]

Hi all, I have gathered all the documents I need for my application (and more!) but I find some things about the online application form confusing, especially to do with the requirement for marriage certificates for all generations "IF APPLICABLE". I am widowed, so presumably I select 'single' on the dropdown menu, but do I need to send in my marriage certificate and my late wife's death certificate? Then there is my late father. I assume I put him down as 'married' but do I need to send his marriage certificate as it doesn't involve a name change? The same question applies to my Irish-born grandfather. Final question - I have a neighbour who is a police officer and a friend who's a GP but I don't think either of them have rubber stamps or business cards. Is it safest to pay a solicitor to do the witnessing etc? Cheers and thanks in advance to anyone who can help.

I recommend sending any government issued certificates that include your name or the names of any generations that are connected to the application. Its not just about name change it helps establish a real person with a real connection to a government agency. I also had no friends with rubber stamps or business cards so I used a Notary Public.

[jdh174]

Good luck everyone, I received my congratulations email onto my passport now
Application 4oct19
Documents received 14oct19
Address confirmation 16Nov21
Congratulations email 25Nov21

I'm so confused, my documents were received on 7th October 2019 and I've heard nothing since. Please can anyone provide me with any reassurance?

[JT97]

Final question - I have a neighbour who is a police officer and a friend who's a GP but I don't think either of them have rubber stamps or business cards. Is it safest to pay a solicitor to do the witnessing etc? Cheers and thanks in advance to anyone who can help.

You can just provide a letter from them on letter headed paper if they don’t have a business card or stamp. But a police officer and GP should have access to an official stamp. It would be the stations stamp for the police officer or the doctors surgery one fro the GP it doesn’t have to be a personalised stamp.

[PlasticPaddyWagon]

That's encouraging! Here's my timeline:

Application submitted: 21 Sep 2019
Documents received: 2 Oct 2019
Address confirmation:
Congratulations email:

One imagines I should be hearing something relatively soon!

Good luck everybody.

Good luck everyone, I received my congratulations email onto my passport now
Application 4oct19
Documents received 14oct19
Address confirmation 16Nov21
Congratulations email 25Nov21

[ripforreallldo]

I'm so confused, my documents were received on 7th October 2019 and I've heard nothing since. Please can anyone provide me with any reassurance?
[/quote]

^^fear not! i wrote them a handwritten letter begging for expedition. they declined, but said they are working on august ‘19 right now. that email was sent this morning.

[TrishMc]

I'm so confused, my documents were received on 7th October 2019 and I've heard nothing since. Please can anyone provide me with any reassurance?

^^fear not! i wrote them a handwritten letter begging for expedition. they declined, but said they are working on august ‘19 right now. that email was sent this morning.
[/quote]

Check the stats here: FBR stats. You are not alone.

[Pb300]

I don’t find these stats particularly reassuring considering my documents were received June 2019 but I have not heard anything. Based on the conversations I believe I may be the longest in the queue. My fear is that my application is lost in the shuffle. Any advise? After nearly 30 months and hearing much later applications have been processed I am losing my patience.

[TrishMc]

I don’t find these stats particularly reassuring considering my documents were received June 2019 but I have not heard anything. Based on the conversations I believe I may be the longest in the queue. My fear is that my application is lost in the shuffle. Any advise? After nearly 30 months and hearing much later applications have been processed I am losing my patience.

No advice, but have you tried contacting FBR via web chat? Was there anything difficult/complicated about your applcation? And some Teams seem to be faster than others...

[jamiepompey]

Good luck everyone, I received my congratulations email onto my passport now
Application 4oct19
Documents received 14oct19
Address confirmation 16Nov21
Congratulations email 25Nov21

Congrats! So just over 2 years. Question, do you need to send back the actual FBR certificate to apply for a passport, or just the number or such? I mean if you're in the register they should be able to confirm that without sending the actual paper I would think?
If not, they should offer some sort of combo thing, where they keep your documentation and use it towards the passport, then send everything back to you. Sending it back and forth seems unnecessary. shrug.

Yep you have to send off the certificate they send you. I was super organised and had the certificate in my hands no more than an hour before it was in the post back to Ireland for the passport application.

[jamiepompey]

Hi all, I have gathered all the documents I need for my application (and more!) but I find some things about the online application form confusing, especially to do with the requirement for marriage certificates for all generations "IF APPLICABLE". I am widowed, so presumably I select 'single' on the dropdown menu, but do I need to send in my marriage certificate and my late wife's death certificate? Then there is my late father. I assume I put him down as 'married' but do I need to send his marriage certificate as it doesn't involve a name change? The same question applies to my Irish-born grandfather. Final question - I have a neighbour who is a police officer and a friend who's a GP but I don't think either of them have rubber stamps or business cards. Is it safest to pay a solicitor to do the witnessing etc? Cheers and thanks in advance to anyone who can help.

I got a solicitor to certify my application. I believe it cost me about £10