British Citizenship Questions - Assistance would be great

[elocin]

1. How do I prove lawful residence? Is this via P60's, I have one original and the rest are email copies from the company secretary, will this suffice, shall I included my payslips?
2. How do I make sure i was 100% in the UK on date of application?
3. Biometrics, I did for PR, do i have to hand in my BRP? Would like to travel whilst application is under consideration.
4. Payment I presume gets taken off by the HO upon receipt of application? what form do you use for Credit Card details?
5. Do I need original letter of employment?
6. Both my parents got ill during my 5 years in the UK which meant a lot of time back in my home country, both of them had terminal illnesses, do i write a letter explaining and asking for discretion?
7. Is it worthwhile to submit a cover letter?
8. For previous immigration applications, do i need to submit all of them until BRP?
9. Is there any service which can check through documents and offer advice prior application?

Any help with the above will be most appreciated.

[Tea_Rocket]

1. How do I prove lawful residence? Is this via P60's, I have one original and the rest are email copies from the company secretary, will this suffice, shall I included my payslips?

Yes, P60s and letters from any employers you had during the qualifying period. Payslips are also good—basically, collect any and all documents that you can that prove your legal residence in the UK.

2. How do I make sure i was 100% in the UK on date of application?

You'll have to check your records for when your holidays were and make sure that your application date doesn't fall on the 5th (or 3rd, if you're applying as the spouse of a UK citizen) anniversary of a date that you weren't in the country.

3. Biometrics, I did for PR, do i have to hand in my BRP? Would like to travel whilst application is under consideration.

After you submit your application, you will get a letter telling you to submit your biometrics. You must do this, even if you have done this for PR or any other visa application. The letter usually comes between 1 and 3 weeks after the application is submitted (see the timeline threads). You have 15 working days from the date on the letter (which arrives by second class post, so effectively five working days get used up in transit) to submit your biometrics. If you don't, they will generally send out a second letter, and if you miss the window for that one, you lose the application fee and have to start over.

If you want to be able travel while your application is under consideration, then you should use a Nationality Checking Service (NCS), which is run through your local authority. Most will let you do a Join Citizenship and Passport application (JCAP), which allows you to apply for a UK passport along when you submit your naturalisation application. This means that if you are approved for citizenship, your passport is sent automatically after you attend your citizenship ceremony.

If you do use an NCS, you will still need to be in the country to submit your biometrics, so it's probably not wise to plan travel until at least 4-6 weeks after you plan on submitting your application.

4. Payment I presume gets taken off by the HO upon receipt of application? what form do you use for Credit Card details?

For some reason, the Home Office don't include the payment slip in Form AN. You can find it on the final page of this document.

5. Do I need original letter of employment?

I assume this is a letter of employment confirming your legal residence in the UK? If you're applying by post, all documents should be originals. If you're applying by NCS, you should take all original documents with you to be copied.

6. Both my parents got ill during my 5 years in the UK which meant a lot of time back in my home country, both of them had terminal illnesses, do i write a letter explaining and asking for discretion?

Yes, though it may not help. How long were you out of the country? How long ago were these absences? If you can wait to apply until you meet the 450 days in the last 5 years and 90 days in the last year requirement, then that's probably better.

7. Is it worthwhile to submit a cover letter?

If there are things in your application that require explanation, then yes. If your application is straight forward, then you don't need to bother. I didn't bother with mine.

8. For previous immigration applications, do i need to submit all of them until BRP?

Not sure what you mean by "previous immigration applications". Do you mean previous Home Office reference numbers?

9. Is there any service which can check through documents and offer advice prior application?

The NCS checks your documents and can tell you if anything is missing from your application (or help you to fill out the parts of the application you're not sure about). If everything's fine, they send your application and the certified copies of all your documents (except for the Life in the UK test pass letter, which gets sent with the application).

If you haven't already done so, you should read through all the documents related to Form AN. In particular, Booklet AN discusses when and how discretion is applied to excess days outside of the UK (page 7).

[elocin]

Do you mean previous Home Office reference numbers?

YES

Thank you so much Tea Rocket, that was incredibly helpful.