Got a RC (EEA1) instead of a PR (EEA3) requested

Hi,
I'm new in this forum. I thought that the people here are very good with their answers so I thought I should try to get some advice.

I applied to HO on 21.10.11 for a Permanent Resident card using the EEA3 form together with enough documentation to support that as a European national (Italian), I have been exercising treaty rights in the UK for more than 5 years.

I was surprised today to receive my passport and supporting documentation back together with a letter from the HO in Liverpool saying that they are enclosing my Registration Certificate. This is not what I applied for? Why would they send me this if a sent the EEA3 form? It doesn't have sense to me. Are they that incompetent?

Please, have any of you had the same problem than me? If yes, what did you do? Did you manage to resolve the problem? Did you finally get your PR? What are you supposed to receive from them exactly? Anybody knows? Is that a letter and a sticker on your passport or am I wrong?

I'm hoping to start a BC process after I received my PR so I would like to resolve this matter as soon as I can.

I would appreciate some comments and advice please.

Thank you in advance.

Well, apparently UKBA does not agree with your claim that you have exercised treaty rights in the UK during five consecutive years. As you don't give any details about your situation I cannot (nor can anybody else on this forum) tell you why. If they did not explain it in accompanying letter, you just have to phone them and ask what happened.

However, for an Italian national like yourself acquiring PR doesn't make any difference in daily life. Also I don't see enough benefits in getting BC that would justify the high fee that you will have to pay for this procedure. You may of course have your own compelling reasons for wishing to get it, but I wouldn't bother.

Hi fysicus,

Thank you for your reply.

The letter they sent does not give any explanation about why they are sending me a RC instead of the PR. They only say: "You have been issued with a Registration Certificate. The RC is enclosed with this letter together with the documents you submitted in support of your application. You should now sign it". So I'm not sure what are the reasons. I think they made a mistake.

The summary of my situation so you can comment is very straight forward:
- I arrived to UK Jan 2005
- Was a job seeker from sept 2005 to Jan 2006.
- I have been working here since Jan 2006 until now.
- It is more than 5 years (from 2006 until 2011 is already 5 years) so it is not important what happened in 2005 but I also enclosed documentation from 2005 to make it easier from them.
- I'm European and I'm married with a British guy
- documents enclosed: last 6 pay slips, all P60s since 2006, job contracts (2), letters from employers (2), emails and confirmations of registration on different employment agencies from sept 2005 to jan 2006 (this is just to put more info as explained above), lease agreements since 2005, bills confirming actual address.

So I'm not sure what happened?

Regarding your last paragraph, I know I don't need to do this but I would like to do it. It is more convenient for us if my husband, my daughter and I have all a passport issued from the same country. So if we are travelling one day and something happened to us we all have the same help. It is a personal option.

Thanks

fysicus wrote:However, for an Italian national like yourself acquiring PR doesn't make any difference in daily life. Also I don't see enough benefits in getting BC that would justify the high fee that you will have to pay for this procedure. You may of course have your own compelling reasons for wishing to get it, but I wouldn't bother.

fvsissa makes a sensible point and I think that with the general global uncertainty, you may find an increasing number of EEA/EU nationals wanting to naturalise in the (EU) country they call home.

Take my husband for instance: He is Swiss, can live and travel freely throughout the Union BUT, in the UK which he calls home, he cannot vote at any level. He finds this very frustrating and sometimes saddening. Also he is concerned about the growing uncertainty about Switzerland's intolerance of the mounting pressure on them to commit to the EU fully. Who knows what will happen if the CH-EU bilaterals become untenable?

His opinion (and mine too) is that we should both naturalise so that (worst case) we can live here freely. Also, If we had no other option but to return to CH (for whatever reason) I may not be able to follow straight away as our marriage is not yet registered there.

Fvsissa, if I were you I would phone or write to them and ask.

Plum70, totally agreed with you. It is better to be prepared just in case. You never know what could happen nowadays!

EUsmileWEallsmild, you are right! I'll call them on Monday in the morning and see what they say. I hope it is a mistake and that they will issue the PR as I initially requested. Finger cross!

If your evidence for exercising treaty rights is simple and straightforward, you can apply directly for British citizenship. No need for EEA3. There is a section in the AN form for naturalisation for EEA nationals (section 2.4) and the evidence required is the same as needed for EEA3. Being married to a British citizen, you can apply on the 5th anniversary of exercising treaty rights.

[quote="Jambo"]If your evidence for exercising treaty rights is simple and straightforward, you can apply directly for British citizenship. No need for EEA3. There is a section in the AN form for naturalisation for EEA nationals (section 2.4) and the evidence required is the same as needed for EEA3. Being married to a British citizen, you can apply on the 5th anniversary of exercising treaty rights.[/quote]

Jambo, what you say is correct. However, if European casework have a problem issuing PR, then perhaps there is an unforeseen problem with the application (that's not to say that the OP could not put that right). It would be better to get the EEA3 sorted out in the first instance. It is fee-free.

I believe that UKBA retain the fee is an AN application is not successful. (Warning, check this for yourself, I've never made such an application and am not likely to do so either).

Hi Jambo, yes this is another option but I think is better to get the PR through the EEA3 form as I don't need to pay any fee. I don't want to risk it even though I think my application is straight forward. I guess the BC process will be much quicker if I already have the PR.

I thought I was going to find more people here with the same problem than mine but it seems that I'm the only one.

Speak to them on Monday.

Hopefully this is just an administrative error done in the last stage in the process i.e. caseworker has approved your PR confirmation and dispatch mistakenly printed a Residence Certificate instead of PR confirmation (it's the same booklet and sticker. Just different wording). If a mistake was done earlier in the process, the HO might ask you to resubmit the application.

Jambo wrote:If a mistake was done earlier in the process, the HO might ask you to resubmit the application.

And you may get it resolved very quickly too if it's their fault.

[quote="Plum70"][quote="Jambo"]If a mistake was done earlier in the process, the HO might ask you to resubmit the application.[/quote]
And you may get it resolved very quickly too if it's their fault.[/quote]

I really hope so too. Please let us know what happens when you get more information.

Jambo wrote:Speak to them on Monday.

Hopefully this is just an administrative error done in the last stage in the process i.e. caseworker has approved your PR confirmation and dispatch mistakenly printed a Residence Certificate instead of PR confirmation (it's the same booklet and sticker. Just different wording). If a mistake was done earlier in the process, the HO might ask you to resubmit the application.

From fvsissa's description it looks a very straightforward case indeed. Another possibility is that they issued the registration certificate and returned the passport as an interim measure, and that the EEA3 application (which is obviously more complicated than an EEA1 application) itself is still being processed in another department.
As I advised in my first reaction, and repeated by others, just phone them to find out, and for now don't worry.

UKBA may have made a mistake.
UKBA may have some point that they are not telling you about, though hopefully they will tell you on the phone.

No matter what, I would encourage you to do a SAR. Basically request your whole UKBA file. See http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/navig ... onal-data/ It is sometimes very interesting what you find!

I wonder if fvsissa has managed to get an explanation from UKBA and would want to share it with us?