Right passport to use for dual nationals?

jimi_man

DullGreyGuy said:

eDicky said:

This thread reports relevant expectations of Border Force officers:

Border Force Officers dont always get it right... g/friend at the time split with her husband after 15 years of marriage with 5 of those being in the UK via EU rights of the ex. She applied for and was granted Permanent Residency on the basis of retained rights 6 months later correctly declaring she had broken up with her ex but she'd continued meeting the requirements under EU legislation and a couple months later she got her passport back with the PR stamp. 

2 years later on her about 10th trip across the border the BFO asked where her EU relation was. She correctly stated she had no idea as they'd lost contact after the divorce. BFO said that it made the PR invalid, she pointed out the divorce was pre-PR and the divorce/retained rights had been accepted when the PR was issued. He wouldn't engage, just said she was wrong and put her in the holding pen. 3 hours later she was released, he stamped her passport and let her cross the border without explanation or comment. 

A few months later she became a British citizen but needed to travel before she could get her British passport. I had read that being British does invalidate PR and so contacted Immigration at the airport to check. Surprisingly got through to the head of immigration who said he wasnt aware of PR being invalidated but pointed out a British Citizen cannot be denied entry but he would make notes on the system just in case so gave her name etc. He then said it was really spooky as he'd just seen her landing card from her previous trip "and like that time she'd cross without problems"... pointed out that being held for 3 hours in a pen isnt exactly without problems and the Head of Immigration said that the BFO hadn't recorded that on the card. 

So, not only getting it wrong but faking documents too!

Hi. I don’t want to get into arguing for the sake of it as neither of us were there so we can’t say what happened. Hopefully some of what is said may be useful to others. 

You are correct in saying U.K. citizens cannot be denied entry (in fact they are exempt from immigration control) however this needs to be established first. So without a U.K. passport and she is claiming to be a U.K. citizen then the officer would need to establish this. (A passport trumps all this). This information would not be available to him on the screen in front of him. Consequently this would need a brief stay in the holding pen.m to work this out which can be a slow or a quick process. (It’s quicker now but never used to be). 

Technically she hadn’t had any problems as she had not been refused entry however I can see that this would have been annoying. But it wouldn’t register as an issue on the system. 

It’s not faking documents at all.  Faking documents is coming up with a whole new document. It’s just not putting the times on. And actually there is no requirement to put the times on now - as I don’t know when this happened I can’t say whether there was a requirement then. 

Not dissing the Head of Immigration but in the same way as the Chief of Police isn’t going to be au fait with all the law and police procedures, the Head of Immigration is in the same boat. He’s also only going to give out an answer based on what you tell him ……

It doesn’t mean that the Border Force person got it wrong at all. They are allowed to detain to discover the facts. Whilst you (she) knew the facts, the BF person didn’t (and just because someone says something it doesn’t mean it’s true !! )  so they are entitled (and expected) to investigate a bit more. Occasionally this takes a while. 

DullGreyGuy

jimi_man said:

DullGreyGuy said:

eDicky said:

This thread reports relevant expectations of Border Force officers:

Border Force Officers dont always get it right... g/friend at the time split with her husband after 15 years of marriage with 5 of those being in the UK via EU rights of the ex. She applied for and was granted Permanent Residency on the basis of retained rights 6 months later correctly declaring she had broken up with her ex but she'd continued meeting the requirements under EU legislation and a couple months later she got her passport back with the PR stamp. 

2 years later on her about 10th trip across the border the BFO asked where her EU relation was. She correctly stated she had no idea as they'd lost contact after the divorce. BFO said that it made the PR invalid, she pointed out the divorce was pre-PR and the divorce/retained rights had been accepted when the PR was issued. He wouldn't engage, just said she was wrong and put her in the holding pen. 3 hours later she was released, he stamped her passport and let her cross the border without explanation or comment. 

A few months later she became a British citizen but needed to travel before she could get her British passport. I had read that being British does invalidate PR and so contacted Immigration at the airport to check. Surprisingly got through to the head of immigration who said he wasnt aware of PR being invalidated but pointed out a British Citizen cannot be denied entry but he would make notes on the system just in case so gave her name etc. He then said it was really spooky as he'd just seen her landing card from her previous trip "and like that time she'd cross without problems"... pointed out that being held for 3 hours in a pen isnt exactly without problems and the Head of Immigration said that the BFO hadn't recorded that on the card. 

So, not only getting it wrong but faking documents too!

Hi. I don’t want to get into arguing for the sake of it as neither of us were there so we can’t say what happened. Hopefully some of what is said may be useful to others. 

You are correct in saying U.K. citizens cannot be denied entry (in fact they are exempt from immigration control) however this needs to be established first. So without a U.K. passport and she is claiming to be a U.K. citizen then the officer would need to establish this. (A passport trumps all this). This information would not be available to him on the screen in front of him. Consequently this would need a brief stay in the holding pen.m to work this out which can be a slow or a quick process. (It’s quicker now but never used to be). 

Technically she hadn’t had any problems as she had not been refused entry however I can see that this would have been annoying. But it wouldn’t register as an issue on the system. 

It’s not faking documents at all.  Faking documents is coming up with a whole new document. It’s just not putting the times on. And actually there is no requirement to put the times on now - as I don’t know when this happened I can’t say whether there was a requirement then. 

Not dissing the Head of Immigration but in the same way as the Chief of Police isn’t going to be au fait with all the law and police procedures, the Head of Immigration is in the same boat. He’s also only going to give out an answer based on what you tell him ……

It doesn’t mean that the Border Force person got it wrong at all. They are allowed to detain to discover the facts. Whilst you (she) knew the facts, the BF person didn’t (and just because someone says something it doesn’t mean it’s true !! )  so they are entitled (and expected) to investigate a bit more. Occasionally this takes a while. 

She wasnt a UK citizen at the time, she was a non-UK resident with a Permanent Residency stamp, she became British shortly after. He stated the PR stamp was invalidated by the break down in the relationship with the EU family member despite the fact the PR stamp was issued a long time after the divorce and had been explicitly applied for on the basis of retained rights.

He didnt have to establish the facts, the facts were given up at the start. He didnt know the rules and categorically stated she was wrong. There was no comment after about the fact it was purely his mistake that had detained her and the whole class. According to the Head of Immigration he should have noted that she was held and enquiries were made, instead he stated she was allowed straight through. 

jimi_man

DullGreyGuy said:

jimi_man said:

DullGreyGuy said:

eDicky said:

This thread reports relevant expectations of Border Force officers:

Border Force Officers dont always get it right... g/friend at the time split with her husband after 15 years of marriage with 5 of those being in the UK via EU rights of the ex. She applied for and was granted Permanent Residency on the basis of retained rights 6 months later correctly declaring she had broken up with her ex but she'd continued meeting the requirements under EU legislation and a couple months later she got her passport back with the PR stamp. 

2 years later on her about 10th trip across the border the BFO asked where her EU relation was. She correctly stated she had no idea as they'd lost contact after the divorce. BFO said that it made the PR invalid, she pointed out the divorce was pre-PR and the divorce/retained rights had been accepted when the PR was issued. He wouldn't engage, just said she was wrong and put her in the holding pen. 3 hours later she was released, he stamped her passport and let her cross the border without explanation or comment. 

A few months later she became a British citizen but needed to travel before she could get her British passport. I had read that being British does invalidate PR and so contacted Immigration at the airport to check. Surprisingly got through to the head of immigration who said he wasnt aware of PR being invalidated but pointed out a British Citizen cannot be denied entry but he would make notes on the system just in case so gave her name etc. He then said it was really spooky as he'd just seen her landing card from her previous trip "and like that time she'd cross without problems"... pointed out that being held for 3 hours in a pen isnt exactly without problems and the Head of Immigration said that the BFO hadn't recorded that on the card. 

So, not only getting it wrong but faking documents too!

Hi. I don’t want to get into arguing for the sake of it as neither of us were there so we can’t say what happened. Hopefully some of what is said may be useful to others. 

You are correct in saying U.K. citizens cannot be denied entry (in fact they are exempt from immigration control) however this needs to be established first. So without a U.K. passport and she is claiming to be a U.K. citizen then the officer would need to establish this. (A passport trumps all this). This information would not be available to him on the screen in front of him. Consequently this would need a brief stay in the holding pen.m to work this out which can be a slow or a quick process. (It’s quicker now but never used to be). 

Technically she hadn’t had any problems as she had not been refused entry however I can see that this would have been annoying. But it wouldn’t register as an issue on the system. 

It’s not faking documents at all.  Faking documents is coming up with a whole new document. It’s just not putting the times on. And actually there is no requirement to put the times on now - as I don’t know when this happened I can’t say whether there was a requirement then. 

Not dissing the Head of Immigration but in the same way as the Chief of Police isn’t going to be au fait with all the law and police procedures, the Head of Immigration is in the same boat. He’s also only going to give out an answer based on what you tell him ……

It doesn’t mean that the Border Force person got it wrong at all. They are allowed to detain to discover the facts. Whilst you (she) knew the facts, the BF person didn’t (and just because someone says something it doesn’t mean it’s true !! )  so they are entitled (and expected) to investigate a bit more. Occasionally this takes a while. 

He didnt have to establish the facts, the facts were given up at the start. He didnt know the rules and categorically stated she was wrong. There was no comment after about the fact it was purely his mistake that had detained her and the whole class. According to the Head of Immigration he should have noted that she was held and enquiries were made, instead he stated she was allowed straight through. 

Unfortunately we live in a world where people don’t always tell the truth. So sometimes just taking the word of someone isn’t good enough and further verification is needed. 

The second point is that you don’t know what was on the screen in front of him when he scanned the passport. If it comes up with further information or there is a marker on the database then further checks have to be made. Border Force don’t disclose this sort of information and the Head you spoke to wouldn’t either. 

Did he get it wrong? We’ll never know but if there was a marker then he did the right thing. Was he justified in what he did under the rules? Absolutely. Should he have written something about it? Yes definitely though I don’t know how long ago it was but I’d imagine he’d still have to write something. 

An unfortunate incident but happens every day. Just because something later turns out to be correct doesn’t mean that it was wrong to stop them in the first place.