Benefits Of Dual Passports

Voyager2002

eamon said:

I have both as well and I'm a UK citizen/resident. The UK passport is just for providing evidence if I ever get asked that I'm entitled to 1) be here, 2) allowed to work here, 3) allowed to rent a property here, 4) apply for a National Rail discount card, 5) prove my entitlement to NHS treatment.

Surely you can do all those things with an Irish passport.

Voyager2002

martindow said:

eamon said:

I have both as well and I'm a UK citizen/resident..... I use my Irish passport for crossing borders.

Does that have practical advantages over using your UK passport?

Absolutely. If you enter Iran with a British passport you need a 'minder' escorting you the whole time, while with an Irish passport you are free to do whatever an Iranian can do (which, to be fair, is not very much).

shaun_from_Africa

m00c0w04 said:

Specifically, I would also like to consider the pro's and cons of living and working abroad with multiple passports if anyone has any thoughts on that?

Which is exactly what I have been doing for the past 30 years.
For me, there are a few good reasons to have 2 passports.
Currently, I have to get an annual work permit which requires a full page in my passport. I also need a medical, something that also gets entered (about 1/2 a page each year) and entry stamps every month or so. Because of this, my UK passport generally needs renewing every 5 or 6 years due to it filling up.

I have an Irish passport that I use solely for personal travel and this only needs renewing every 10 years.
It also means that if my UK passport is in the process of being renewed, I can still go on holiday.

I don't take my Irish passport with me when working because without a valid entry stamp, it would be useless in some countries and could even cause problems if I'm found to have it.

eamon

Voyager2002 said:

eamon said:

I have both as well and I'm a UK citizen/resident. The UK passport is just for providing evidence if I ever get asked that I'm entitled to 1) be here, 2) allowed to work here, 3) allowed to rent a property here, 4) apply for a National Rail discount card, 5) prove my entitlement to NHS treatment.

Surely you can do all those things with an Irish passport.

Yes I can and I know the current rules. But not everybody else does and the rules can change. The last 5 years have seen lots of story's and the implementation of new rules re access to state services. In the absence of ID cards it seemed a prudent thing to do.

m00c0w04

eamon said:

I have both as well and I'm a UK citizen/resident. The UK passport is just for providing evidence if I ever get asked that I'm entitled to 1) be here, 2) allowed to work here, 3) allowed to rent a property here, 4) apply for a National Rail discount card, 5) prove my entitlement to NHS treatment. I use my Irish passport for crossing borders.

Out of curiosity, how would one prove such things in the absence of a British passport?

I guess that a birth certificate to show that you were born in the UK should be sufficient, right?

196055

NoodleDoodleMan said:

Applying for an Irish passport for other nationals who are eligible to do so is both expensive and bureaucratic - and can take many months to be completed through the system.

I have the right to apply through my paternal grandmother - the fee is/was 700 Euro plus a stack of birth and marriage certificates covering parents and grandparents as well as my own - plus copies of all. If successful that puts you on the register - from where there is the additional cost for the actual passport.

Another downside is that Irish citizenship would end with me - spouses, children and grandchildren do not qualify.

I found the process easy, took less than 5 months from initial application, Foreign Birth Registration then passport. Cost me less than £430 in total ( I already had a few of the certificates though). Children do qualify if they are born after you have citizenship,

Cost is all relative, but as I had to get a carte de sejour in France back in the early 90s, I can say that process is harder.

UK passport is now no longer needed for me, so will not be renewed.

Sandtree

NoodleDoodleMan said:

Applying for an Irish passport for other nationals who are eligible to do so is both expensive and bureaucratic - and can take many months to be completed through the system.

I have the right to apply through my paternal grandmother - the fee is/was 700 Euro plus a stack of birth and marriage certificates covering parents and grandparents as well as my own - plus copies of all. If successful that puts you on the register - from where there is the additional cost for the actual passport.

Another downside is that Irish citizenship would end with me - spouses, children and grandchildren do not qualify.

That simply isnt a downside of holding an irish passport... it may be a downside of holding an irish passport -v- some other nationality but that wasnt the question asked. If you don't hold irish citizenship then your spouse, children and grandchildren equally dont automatically qualify for irish citizenship.

I got my irish citizenship and passport in 2012 and have to say it was exceptionally straight forward... mine was a little different as it wasnt via birth but basically had to submit an affidavit with a notary stamp. I got an email confirming my citizenship had been approved but it would take a few weeks for the certificate to be posted. I spoke to them on the phone and they said I could apply for the passport in the meantime and "they can call us if they want to check but they'll understand these things take time". In reality I got the email to say the passport was ready to collect without submitting any documents and they almost passed me the passport across the counter before asking would it be a problem for me actually to provide my evidence... if I had been marginaly quicker I could have probably have grabbed the passport before they asked and legged it but I simply came back later that day with the now received certificate plus relevant other docs and they handed it over.

Remember that the UK is also highly unusual in that it will allow its citizens to have two british passports which can be useful if you travel a lot for business (use one whilst the other is off somewhere getting a visa etc). and so "dual passports" depends if you mean same or different nationalities. 

For having the passports themselves the only downside is the cost of renewing them. There can be other benefits than those listed such as travel to Israel & the rest of the middle east... several other ME countries say they wont allow you access if you've been to Israel (not sure how practically enforced this is) but to avoid the risk you can visit on one and the other countries on the other.

There can be disadvantages of dual nationality, irrespective of if you have a passport or not for the second nationality, some countries always tax their citizens or require them to follow certain laws irrespective in the world where they live. So US citizens must file tax returns each year but often there are reciprocal taxation agreements so those in the UK note what UK taxes they've paid and these are taken off of what the US would require them to pay (most often this leaves a balance of nil as uk income taxes are higher).

silvercar

“ There can be other benefits than those listed such as travel to Israel & the rest of the middle east... several other ME countries say they wont allow you access if you've been to Israel (not sure how practically enforced this is) but to avoid the risk you can visit on one and the other countries on the other.”

Israel hasn’t stamped foreign passports for a few years. Instead they give you a small chit of paper on entrance and exit. So this is no longer an issue.

NoodleDoodleMan

196055 said:

NoodleDoodleMan said:

Applying for an Irish passport for other nationals who are eligible to do so is both expensive and bureaucratic - and can take many months to be completed through the system.

I have the right to apply through my paternal grandmother - the fee is/was 700 Euro plus a stack of birth and marriage certificates covering parents and grandparents as well as my own - plus copies of all. If successful that puts you on the register - from where there is the additional cost for the actual passport.

Another downside is that Irish citizenship would end with me - spouses, children and grandchildren do not qualify.

I found the process easy, took less than 5 months from initial application, Foreign Birth Registration then passport. Cost me less than £430 in total ( I already had a few of the certificates though). Children do qualify if they are born after you have citizenship,

Cost is all relative, but as I had to get a carte de sejour in France back in the early 90s, I can say that process is harder.

UK passport is now no longer needed for me, so will not be renewed.

Does either of your parents have Irish nationality ?

I suspect the regulations in that case may be different from people in my category who have an Irish grandparent ?

The Embassy in London advised me that citizenship, if granted, did not follow on to my children, and that my spouse was not eligible in any scenario.

At my age it was/is not worth the candle to pursue the matter, especially as 'er indoors , our son and grandkids would not be able to apply.

NoodleDoodleMan

silvercar said:

“ There can be other benefits than those listed such as travel to Israel & the rest of the middle east... several other ME countries say they wont allow you access if you've been to Israel (not sure how practically enforced this is) but to avoid the risk you can visit on one and the other countries on the other.”

Israel hasn’t stamped foreign passports for a few years. Instead they give you a small chit of paper on entrance and exit. So this is no longer an issue.

On both our visits to Israel the immigration officer stapled a card on to our passports and explained this would removed on leaving the country.

There are Islamic countries outwith the Middle East who are also likely to prevent access where they see an Isreali immigration stamp.