Citizenship Ceremony cancelled due to Covid-19

Chuga wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 6:43 pm

Thanks Baybars1, never knew different department deal with invitation after the approval.

• Managed Migration Support Team (MMST) – operates at the beginning of the process and
  undertakes tasks such as the creation of new files, file tracking, updating electronic records, collection
  of fees and security checks.

• Nationality Casework Teams – four casework teams operate during the day and one during the
  evening. They are responsible for deciding applications for British citizenship.

• Citizenship Ceremonies Support Team (CCST) – supports the citizenship ceremonies process,
  including the printing and despatch of certificates.

• Contact Centre – answers telephone and e-mail enquiries from customers.

Soo123 wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 14, 2020 10:33 pm

Hi U Aziz

How was your ceremony ?
Did Hillingdon council let you attend the ceremony without the invitation letter ?

Regards

baybars1 wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 8:06 pm

Chuga wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 6:43 pm

Thanks Baybars1, never knew different department deal with invitation after the approval.

You are welcome. Incidentally, you can find more about it in an audit report (link below). While the overall entity has been renamed as UK Visas and Immigration, the Nationality Group seems to be working as it used to before the re-branding, except perhaps for the MMST because they are now collecting biometric data from applicants, which wasn't done in 2010, and the Contact Centre, which I believe is now at least partly outsourced:

Approximately 450 people work within Nationality Group, situated in two sites in Liverpool. The
inspection focused on the work of the following teams:

• Managed Migration Support Team (MMST) – operates at the beginning of the process and
  undertakes tasks such as the creation of new files, file tracking, updating electronic records, collection
  of fees and security checks.

• Nationality Casework Teams – four casework teams operate during the day and one during the
  evening. They are responsible for deciding applications for British citizenship.

• Citizenship Ceremonies Support Team (CCST) – supports the citizenship ceremonies process,
  including the printing and despatch of certificates.

• Contact Centre – answers telephone and e-mail enquiries from customers.

page 7 of:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.u ... p_2010.pdf

Incidentally, a separate report shows that the UKVI is by far the most lucrative part of the Home Office, having made about £500 million profit in the fiscal year of 2017/18. It was followed by the HM Passport Office, which made just shy of £172 million profit in the same year. All the other departments far outspent their income. This is not unusual, by the way, as you would not expect a police force to be a for-profit entity. However, the mere fact that they are netting half a billion profit from immigration applications in a given year while providing such a poor service speaks for itself.

englishcrumpet wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 8:59 pm

Astonishing numbers @baybars1 . With making that much money should be absolutely no problem to introduce a track & trace system for invites, certificates, etc... They can even roll out virtual ceremonies by providing software to councils. Probably they are not interested in investing money in that field which is a very unpleasant situation.

Tirinti wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 10:21 pm

englishcrumpet wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 8:59 pm

Astonishing numbers @baybars1 . With making that much money should be absolutely no problem to introduce a track & trace system for invites, certificates, etc... They can even roll out virtual ceremonies by providing software to councils. Probably they are not interested in investing money in that field which is a very unpleasant situation.

I think most council have already either Zoom or Microsoft Teams. If not there are free version good enough for virtual ceremony and paid version cost about £100 per year per user. I don't think council needs more than one account. If virtual ceremony takes 10mins they can have easily 40 per day or 800 per month. If they charge £10 extra for virtual ceremony the licence fee will be covered after 2 hours. And I'm sure all of us would pay £10 extra to have it done. And even without extra charge, I'm sure cost of hosting group ceremonies is more than £100 per year.

Tirinti wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 10:21 pm

I think most council have already either Zoom or Microsoft Teams. If not there are free version good enough for virtual ceremony and paid version cost about £100 per year per user. I don't think council needs more than one account. If virtual ceremony takes 10mins they can have easily 40 per day or 800 per month. If they charge £10 extra for virtual ceremony the licence fee will be covered after 2 hours. And I'm sure all of us would pay £10 extra to have it done. And even without extra charge, I'm sure cost of hosting group ceremonies is more than £100 per year.

baybars1 wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 10:37 am

Tirinti wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 25, 2020 10:21 pm

I think most council have already either Zoom or Microsoft Teams. If not there are free version good enough for virtual ceremony and paid version cost about £100 per year per user. I don't think council needs more than one account. If virtual ceremony takes 10mins they can have easily 40 per day or 800 per month. If they charge £10 extra for virtual ceremony the licence fee will be covered after 2 hours. And I'm sure all of us would pay £10 extra to have it done. And even without extra charge, I'm sure cost of hosting group ceremonies is more than £100 per year.

This is a great idea in theory, if anything, it reduces the risk of catching the virus by having to attend in person.

As for whether a hypothetical switch ti 100% virtual ceremonies would accelerate the process, the bottleneck seems to be the limited capacity at the Home Office for printing of the certificates, not the inability of local councils to arrange ceremonies within the extended six-month deadline.

What might do the trick is of digital certificates for the purposed of passport applications. The Home Office that would have approved your naturalisation/registration and it is the Home Office that would issue you with a British Citizen passport too.

Local councils can do the ceremony, but instead of being handed a paper certificate, the Home Office would log you as a newly-minted citizen and advise you by email that you can now apply for a British Citizen Passport if you fill in the online form and send over your foreign passport as a supporting document. Citizenship certificate wouldn't be necessary because you are already in the system.

If you do wish to have a paper certificate, you can be given an option to order one, which they can deliver at leisure (take a year if they like), because you would already have your British passport as a more useful proof of your British nationality anyway.

Time to leave the XX century, but I fear that the Home Office would not go for this simple change for at least another decade. It had taken them like forever to embrace the online application forms...

VulgarisMagistralis wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 11:17 am

I've been keeping tabs on this thread for some 3 months already. I got my approval letter via email in August, but I can't understand this process. Would someone be able to walk me through the logic?

Why does the Home Office need 12 weeks or so to print and send a letter to me and to my council?

I understand that there is a case of communicating the council and I understand that I need an official certificate in public records, not too different from a marriage or birth certificate. But why 12 weeks? I mean.. how hard can it be to print 2 pieces of paper and post them? They certainly can send approval letters rather quickly, so why can't they send the invitation in the same occasion?

Seriously, what happens behind the scenes? What's the difficulty? Does anyone know? Is it only a matter of a large amount of letters? Can't they send letters to councils online?

baybars1 wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 11:57 am

VulgarisMagistralis wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 11:17 am

I've been keeping tabs on this thread for some 3 months already. I got my approval letter via email in August, but I can't understand this process. Would someone be able to walk me through the logic?

Why does the Home Office need 12 weeks or so to print and send a letter to me and to my council?

I understand that there is a case of communicating the council and I understand that I need an official certificate in public records, not too different from a marriage or birth certificate. But why 12 weeks? I mean.. how hard can it be to print 2 pieces of paper and post them? They certainly can send approval letters rather quickly, so why can't they send the invitation in the same occasion?

Seriously, what happens behind the scenes? What's the difficulty? Does anyone know? Is it only a matter of a large amount of letters? Can't they send letters to councils online?

According to the information from the Home Office, as shared by one of the other members, nowadays at least, citizenship certificates have security features that make them unsuitable for regular printing. I have checked out again my certificate issued in 2010 and it doesn't seem like much at all, but they might have bumped up some security tweaks in the meantime.

(Maybe I can order a fresh copy, just to see what the improved model looks like, but would hate to compete with the people who are awaiting completion their naturalisation/registration process and are therefore in genuine need of one).

Anyway, it appears that the capacity to print certificates is very limited. As they imposed a total lockdown on office work in March, a huge backlog, of about 20,000 certificates had been created until the restarted the process in August. According to my estimates, they have been printing about 280 certificates per day and while the have been issuing about half as many approvals. They started clearing the backlog on 7 August for those approved after 18 March 2020. That gives you some idea as to when your certificate might arrive.

Also, the process can grind to a halt yet again if there be a Covid outbreak among the Home Office CCST's printing staff.

Black_diallo wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 23, 2020 3:50 pm

- Date of approval: 1st of July 2020
- 25th of August 2020, I chased the HO for an update in regards to my ceremony letter as I have to apply for
my British passport and travel urgently for compassionate reasons. My father is really ill and he has no one to care for him. I requested for my ceremony letter to be expedited and attached a letter from my father's doctor stating his health condition and that he needs me to be there to care for him.
other than myself.
- 5th of October 2020 (over a month later), I received a response saying that my ceremony invitation letter
has been dispatched on the 29th of September 2020 and to allow 10 working days to receive it.
- 14th of October (11 working days later), no letter was received so I chased the HO again for an update.
- 15th of October, I received a response from the HO saying that my request has been forwarded to the right
department.
- 23rd of October(today), I received the below response

" We have identified that your ceremony invitation has not been despatched yet. We apologise for this administrative oversight. Whilst your ceremony invitation has been printed, your citizenship ceremony documents have not yet been printed or despatched to the local authority, however these documents are being prepared.
When the citizenship documents for your local authority are ready, your ceremony invitation will be despatched. You should be in receipt of your ceremony invitation within 3 to 4 weeks. If you have not received your invitation after this time, please contact us
In order to expedite an application, we require evidence as to why the application should be prioritised, this includes expediting the despatch of ceremony invitations. If you can provide evidence, we can pass this to the relevant department for consideration."

My dad's health is getting critical and I am worried that he will pass in my absence. I haven't seen him for 10 years and unfortunately the HO is not making this any easier. I am really disappointed at the way they have handled this.

minikube wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 12:35 pm

End of May approval, still no invitation letter despite council having the certificate for four weeks already. Can’t book ceremony without.

rayyfar wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 11:17 am

My post man has been no news for me
Approved 23rd of july

axeman85 wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 26, 2020 1:27 pm

The Home Office is just a catastrophic department that hides under data protection act and laws. Which gives them the right not to give out personal or sensitive information.

Why cant the call centre have access to basic information like when and if letters have been printed and or sent..

They ask you to send emails that takes forever to reply and when they do, its just generic replies and no relevant information.

I know someone who received a certificate years back. Its just A4 size with your details in it. So I wonder why they take long to print and send .

Even if they send 2nd class it takes just 3 -5 days. But I guess one unit prints, another unit sends out hence the long delays from printing to receiving it.

Wonder why they can't make full exceptions especially with covid to letters and certificates...