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The form asks for the referee to be "a person of professional standing, such as a doctor, a minister of religion, civil servant or a member of a professional body e.g. accountant or solicitor", which is not exactly the same as saying that they must have a profession.stedman wrote:IT is a profession, isn't it? And there is nowhere on the naturalization form that asks what profession the referee is anyway.
This was the case until the end of last year, when the new requirement was introduced. In January I called the naturalisation helpline to ask for clarification on this matter and was told that "anyone working in a professional organisation" would do. However, it didn't sound like the person I was talking to had much of a clue about anything. When I asked him if it was necessary for the "person of standing" to have a British passport he said "it doesn't say so", but wouldn't answer my question. In any case, they probably don't carry out referee checks on all applications.stedman wrote: I know someone who used their unemployed neighbour as a referee, successfully. And a few other similar stories. The person being a UK citizen of good standing is the most important thing. They are more fussy when it comes to actually applying for the passport.
Sure, but in practice it's more or less the same thing. I'm a doctor and before I got UK citizenship my patients assumed I was British and regularly brought their passport or naturalization forms to me to countersign. I explained why I couldn't do it (even now I am a UK citizen I'm reluctant to sign as I don't know them personally) and their response was always that they knew no-one else of professional standing who had known them for 2/3 years. In almost all cases they took my advice (i.e. do not interpret "professional standing" so rigidly) and gave the forms to random non-relatives to countersign, successfully. It appears as long as the referee isn't a criminal or a vagrant residing under Waterloo bridge the application is unlikely to be turned down.Marco 72 wrote:The form asks for the referee to be "a person of professional standing, such as a doctor, a minister of religion, civil servant or a member of a professional body e.g. accountant or solicitor", which is not exactly the same as saying that they must have a profession.
It might help if the referee was a professional member of the British Computer Society. (http://www.bcs.org)Marco 72 wrote:The form asks for the referee to be "a person of professional standing, such as a doctor, a minister of religion, civil servant or a member of a professional body e.g. accountant or solicitor", which is not exactly the same as saying that they must have a profession.stedman wrote:IT is a profession, isn't it? And there is nowhere on the naturalization form that asks what profession the referee is anyway.
Don't forget that "knowing someone for three years" doesn't mean that you have to be in regular day-to-day contact with that person at the time of the application. In other words, you could meet someone today, see them regularly/frequently for the next six months, and then (for example) move house and so not see them often, or even at all. But three years after you met them you would still have known them for three years.champion wrote:Well I kept on moving place in every 6 month to 1 year.
There was no mention of other professions (I only mentioned doctor, solicitor, accountant and minister of religion in my e-mail). I understand that their replies are always terse and unhelpful, which is a shame.I am sorry but the referees need to meet all of the requirements as
stated in the Notes for Guidance that accompany the application form AN.
ombo wrote:I have the same problem - I've only visited a doctor once, talked to a solicitor twice, don't know any accountants and I work in IT where people are not normally members of a professional body.
I've e-mailed the home office and got this reply:
There was no mention of other professions (I only mentioned doctor, solicitor, accountant and minister of religion in my e-mail). I understand that their replies are always terse and unhelpful, which is a shame.I am sorry but the referees need to meet all of the requirements as
stated in the Notes for Guidance that accompany the application form AN.
Thanks for posting the "partial" list, but it still doesn't help. Anyone knows a solicitor who needs a friend?
It would also permit BIA to get confirmation, for example, that the employer information is correct, and indeed the NINO is real and allocated to the applicant.Yeah I noticed the HMRC authorisation but even that has its limitation as it seems they are more interested if you paid taxes not your income.
Undoubtedly anyone dealing with applications at BIA would have needed to sign the Official Secrets Act. The best hope you have is making a Freedom of Information Act request for unpublished guidance to be disclosed. But even then there are provisions in the FOI which might permit them a legitimate excuse for denying such a request.I was hoping that maybe that guy who worked for them at one point could give us some helpful hints without breaching any confidentiality agreements as I am sure they probably asked him to sign.
Any idea whether this is 100% true ? Or is it a case of which caseworker takes the application ?maveli62 wrote:I think the person of professional standing may not be British Citizen anyone residing in UK is eligible. This was told by the Home Office staff and I know a person got naturalisation with a signature from a doctor who holds an Indian Passport holder
No, the referees for a naturalisation must be British citizens. For a passport application they may be either British or Irish citizens, I think. (All Commonwealth citizens used to be eligible to counter-sign a passport application, but not any more.)maveli62 wrote:Any idea whether this is 100% true ? Or is it a case of which caseworker takes the application ?maveli62 wrote:I think the person of professional standing may not be British Citizen anyone residing in UK is eligible. This was told by the Home Office staff and I know a person got naturalisation with a signature from a doctor who holds an Indian Passport holder