I got my EEA2 today!!!!

Finally!

Thought people might like to know the specifics. I applied for it on July 30th. I used my wife's Italian national ID card and not her passport, though I included a copy of it. Her payslips had my last name on them instead of the name on her passport (I was very worried about this). Also, my boss sent the HO a letter asking if they could speed it up, not sure if this helped. Also, none of my documents were officially translated. I had my wife translate them herself and we included it in the application. I guess it worked.

I also made the mistake of applying for the FLR(M) instead of the EEA2. This was rejected, but they still made me pay about £400 odd pounds. I will now appeal and try to get this back.

My main concern now is that my passport expires in 2 years, and I've read that you cannot transfer EU status stuff to new passports, so I guess I will have to do this all over again in a few years. Oh well. Maybe next time I'll apply at the same time as my wife and she'll apply for the EEA1.

Thank you everyone for all your help during this awful, awful, awful process.

spencerand wrote:I also made the mistake of applying for the FLR(M) instead of the EEA2. This was rejected, but they still made me pay about £400 odd pounds. I will now appeal and try to get this back.

It seems like a lot of country try this, Holland certainly asked us to pay about 800 Euro for a visa. They were up front about it, so we refused. You should be able to claim your money back, especially if you were not informed of the costs (and not of the alternatives).

My main concern now is that my passport expires in 2 years, and I've read that you cannot transfer EU status stuff to new passports, so I guess I will have to do this all over again in a few years.

You cannot transfer it, because you don't need to. Legally the sticker is your residence card, which just happens to be in your passport. So even if the passport is expired, the card remains valid.

thsths wrote:

spencerand wrote:I also made the mistake of applying for the FLR(M) instead of the EEA2. This was rejected, but they still made me pay about £400 odd pounds. I will now appeal and try to get this back.

It seems like a lot of country try this, Holland certainly asked us to pay about 800 Euro for a visa. They were up front about it, so we refused. You should be able to claim your money back, especially if you were not informed of the costs (and not of the alternatives).

My main concern now is that my passport expires in 2 years, and I've read that you cannot transfer EU status stuff to new passports, so I guess I will have to do this all over again in a few years.

You cannot transfer it, because you don't need to. Legally the sticker is your residence card, which just happens to be in your passport. So even if the passport is expired, the card remains valid.

That's true, thsths. But spencerand is also right in that if he wanted the residence sticker in his new passport, he would have to make the EEA2 application all over again, as the sticker is non-transferable.