Minister Shatter introduces major changes to citizenship app

[shintaxyz]

I believe this might interest a lot of people.

http://inis.gov.ie/en/JELR/Pages/PR11000088

[Tandor]

Oh man that is fantastic. We'll hand ours in on the day the new forms are released!

After 11 years legally resident, about time I sorted this out.

[fatty patty]

fair play to minister shatter another positive move.

[Obie]

This is fabulous, how could anyone say this minister is stupid and dont know what he is doing. It is quite refreshing indeed. Go Mr Shatters, another gold star for you.

[Aceform]

I believe this might interest a lot of people.

http://inis.gov.ie/en/JELR/Pages/PR11000088

Great news.

[kiwiwife]

Brilliant,
notice the part about the numbers of applicants approved in the last two and a half months being greater than that for all of 2010!

Maybe some of us will be really lucky and won't be waiting years!

I must say that form was stupid. I didn't really know what was and wasn't relevant for me, being the spouse of an Irish national...

[9jeirean]

I have said before and will continue to say it. Alan Shatter has proven himself as a man not only of words and of actions. He is a breath of fresh air. He has kept largely with a lot of of his promise on restructuring the Irish immigration system.

5,578 citizenship applications have been dealt with in the past 2 and a half months which exceeds the full year total for 2010 which was 5,038.

Nuff said. All the Mary(s) have been forced off their tea cups and back to their desks

"I was astonished to discover that approx 55% of all citizenship applications received by the Immigration and Naturalisation Service had to be returned to applicants due to their being incorrectly completed. It was evident, prior to my appointment as Minister, that citizenship application forms were unnecessarily complex and obtuse and I took immediate steps to remedy this. By the end of this week (Friday, 17th June) new application forms will be available online at www.inis.gov.ie. These new arrangements should dramatically reduce the numbers incorrectly completed and substantially contribute to more efficient and streamlined processing times."

I've always found this very insulting to naturalization applicants. The INIS has always blamed the applicants for wrongfully completing the application form and they use that as an excuse for the long delay in the processing. Thanks be to jeyzuz somebody finally has a brain. If 55% of your customers have a problem with your tool of transaction, you get your ar5e back to the drawing board and modify it to suit.

Alan Is fear maith, Dia air

9jeirean

[doesnotcompute]

This is fabulous, how could anyone say this minister is stupid and dont know what he is doing. It is quite refreshing indeed. Go Mr Shatters, another gold star for you.

absolutely agree. Minister Shatter is very progressive, and seems to be pushing all the right buttons so far.

[knapps]

you guys made my day.
This is the best every best news I got in 2011.

I was going to send my application tomorrow morning..now it seems i have to wait for the new form to go online..


wowwwww

Alan Shatter Rocks!!!!!

So guys, I must wait now for new form? right????

[doesnotcompute]

No sign of the new form yet at inis.gov.ie

Patiently waiting.

[Southern_Sky]

Simply Astonishing!

In the past 2½ months, the Department of Justice has dealt with 5,578 citizenship applications, which exceeds the full-year total of applications dealt with in 2010, it said.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ire ... tml?via=mr


Would be interesting what % of applications are actually successful.
Is this increased processing rate purely correspondence back to applicants for more documents?
How do they speed up the vetting with outside agencies, eg. Garda?
The Minister's probably even can't find his desk now, cause its covered in thousands of processed applications
He must be ambidextrous signing them off with both hands

[ImmigrationLawyer]

I just received 2 approvals in the last few days of really old applications, from 2007. They were not "straightforward" applications, one guy was self employed and owed tax, took him ages to get a tax clearance cert, that type of messing... still 4 years is clearly excessive. Looks like they're doing a clear out of all the old cases, which is great!

[9jeirean]

@Southern_Sky:

New Irish citizens will have to swear oath of fidelity
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ire ... tml?via=mr

You've got to laugh at the IT caption of the story. Like naturalization applicants currently don't swear oaths . Talk of ego massaging.

The exact percentage of approvals will be made known in due course, I however think those are actually done and dusted cases i.e approvals/rejection. In the main, most of the old applicants that I know all got approvals and if you follow the thread here http://www.immigrationboards.com/viewto ... start=4260 there have been many recent decisions all approvals. There are a sizable late 2009 applicants who are also getting approvals. So the train is indeed moving.

Is this increased processing rate purely correspondence back to applicants for more documents?

Actually on the contrary, it appears the INIS is now moving away from the old tradition of requesting for further documents i.e payslips bank statements etc before Garda and SW verification. In relation to Garda vetting, Alan Shatter did promise a dedicated Garda vetting officer for the naturalization process. With the recent pace of movement and the promise of a 6 months turn around, one can only assume that this is now in place. I think Alan is genuinely committed to streamlining the process and removing some of the old senseless bottlenecks. I hope he sustains the momentum.


9jeirean

[fatty patty]

You've got to laugh at the IT caption of the story. Like naturalization applicants currently don't swear oaths . Talk of ego massaging.

Massaging for sure and in the same news article couple of paragraphs down...

Mr Shatter said he had “substantial concernsâ€

[doesnotcompute]

inis put a new page up on their site about citizenship:

http://www.inis.gov.ie/en/INIS/Pages/WP07000038

But the links on the page seem to point to a server in the DOJ network's internal domain, so they're inaccessible from the internet... I think their webmaster messed up the links, or maybe hasn't made the pages live yet...

[knapps]

i checked the link..new form is on the website...
that means i have to go back to notary and pay money for another attestation:-((

though, i am going to gain 2 years

[doesnotcompute]

i checked the link..new form is on the website...
that means i have to go back to notary and pay money for another attestation:-((

though, i am going to gain 2 years

It says on the new webpage that you cannot use the new forms until 24th June. If you've filled out an application form already, you can send it up until 23rd June

[aya101]

does applicants of the old form fill out the new form and send it or will the department send replies to them within the next 6 months ?

[knapps]

that's good..i read that too that new form will take effect from 24th
so, i will send mine on monday..they will get it on tuesday 21st...hope they dont send back...

[walrusgumble]

I have said before and will continue to say it. Alan Shatter has proven himself as a man not only of words and of actions. He is a breath of fresh air. He has kept largely with a lot of of his promise on restructuring the Irish immigration system.

5,578 citizenship applications have been dealt with in the past 2 and a half months which exceeds the full year total for 2010 which was 5,038.

Nuff said. All the Mary(s) have been forced off their tea cups and back to their desks

"I was astonished to discover that approx 55% of all citizenship applications received by the Immigration and Naturalisation Service had to be returned to applicants due to their being incorrectly completed. It was evident, prior to my appointment as Minister, that citizenship application forms were unnecessarily complex and obtuse and I took immediate steps to remedy this. By the end of this week (Friday, 17th June) new application forms will be available online at www.inis.gov.ie. These new arrangements should dramatically reduce the numbers incorrectly completed and substantially contribute to more efficient and streamlined processing times."

I've always found this very insulting to naturalization applicants. The INIS has always blamed the applicants for wrongfully completing the application form and they use that as an excuse for the long delay in the processing. Thanks be to jeyzuz somebody finally has a brain. If 55% of your customers have a problem with your tool of transaction, you get your ar5e back to the drawing board and modify it to suit.

Alan Is fear maith, Dia air

9jeirean

The returning of documents should not be an excuse for the delays.

But, there is an extortionate amount of applications being returned to applicants due to carelessness on their part. Its even worse as many of them have lawyers.

A genuine question, what part of the application form, and guidelines do applicant's find difficult? It is very straight forward and asks basic details. (why they ask about parent's details is a bit odd)

The following are examples of reasons applications are returned

1. Some people fail to meet the reckonable residency requirement of 3/5 years and still put the application in. Reckonable residency clear refers to legal status and not merely living here. Note the importance of never delaying in getting residence renewed.

2. Failure to sign the statutory declaration properly , despite requiring a lawyer to witness it

3. Spelling mistakes on birth certificates, or the spelling does not correspond with the name contained in either the passport, marriage certs, application forms itself. INIS are not at fault for this surely? THe applicant had over 5 years to amend the mistakes, surely?

4. Failure to provide all the relevant supporting documents to proove that you did live in Ireland or work in Ireland , despite the checklist clearly requiring it, in simple English

5. Failure to get copies of passports etc certified as true copies, despite clearly requesting it. This allows the applicant to retain their originals so that they are not at risk of being lost, (through no fault of either the inis or applicant)

6. Failure to fill up the application form despite being clearly required to do so.


Do people find the application difficult to understand? Is it due to language reasons? (that would be extremely worrying if it was, a naturalised person having difficulty speaking the main language of the country fluently/competently)

Why not get other people to help? Many have solicitors helping them yet mistakes are made. That is carelessness. The citizenship application is one of the most important applications an immigrant will ever make. if they were filling out their tax assessments you will be sure that due care would be taken (far more extensive application form)

If people have genuine complaints regarding the application form they should make their complaints heard. It might save losts of money in wasted time and postage.

In my opinion, the application is straight forward. THe reasons the applications are returned are through the careleness of the applicant or their lawyer

[knapps]

I have a question.

I just sent my application. In Form 8 where does it say you have to provide a certified copy of your passport.

It says

Copy of your passport showing permission to remain stamps for a period of 1 year immediately prior to the application and 4 years in the 8 year period before that, 60 months in total.

Where they need certified copies they mentioned...like birth certificate and marriage certificate....etc

[walrusgumble]

I have a question.

I just sent my application. In Form 8 where does it say you have to provide a certified copy of your passport.

It says

Copy of your passport showing permission to remain stamps for a period of 1 year immediately prior to the application and 4 years in the 8 year period before that, 60 months in total.

Where they need certified copies they mentioned...like birth certificate and marriage certificate....etc

http://www.inis.gov.ie/en/INIS/Form%208 ... 02011).pdf

i can't find a link to the older version of the passport application form. Its on the check list at the back older version, the request for certified marriage cert is also stated, again on section regarding marriage. same for birth cert section



Sorry its not passports its the other documents, like birth certificate.

Jesus the new site, is pretty funky. Good idea having the residency calculator.

I will admit, it the site and form does look more user friendly all the same.



Heaven forbid i was nearly expecting them to allow people allow for irish citizenship through their own language. if anyone manages to mess that up, they need shooting. what a great indication of the intelligence one has, on that ground, it should be refused alone.

Good idea for Shatter, reduce the costs as much as possible.

[knapps]

yes it is very user friendly...now one can find out whether they have 5 years of reckon able residence or not.

My vote will go to Final Gael next time:-)

[Tandor]

What's up with the "You may not enter stamp periods prior to XXXXXX as they are not reckonable based on your application date" on the residency calculator?

I lose 2 years of stamps based on this (when putting the 27th of June '11 as the application date).

Are they discounting periods of residency after a set time?

[PIKKA]

The returning of documents should not be an excuse for the delays.

But, there is an extortionate amount of applications being returned to applicants due to carelessness on their part. Its even worse as many of them have lawyers.

In my opinion, the application is straight forward. THe reasons the applications are returned are through the careleness of the applicant or their lawyer

I am totally agree with you all about filling the application forms but how is that possible for INIS after March 2011 that they are processing the applications with that speed. Are they doing any Checks or just using a magic stick on a Pile of applications and whoever is in this Pile is getting his/her approval.

Is incorrect applications really the root cause or they are just producing lamb excuses? I think it is only the incompetency of the previous Government that 22,000 applicants had to suffer that situation.