No payment taken or acknowledgement

[AdInfernos]

Hello.

I sent my application for BC on 19th September and was received by the Home Office on the 20th (proof of delivery at Royal Mail track and trace).

So far they have not taken any payment from my credit card. Neither they have sent any acknowledgement email or letter or requested biometrics.

The September timeline e thread shows that everybody who applied by the 19th have already received acknowledgement. Even some who applied later. The only difference I can see is that most applications were made through NCS and mine by post.

So my question is, is it possible that NCS are given some priority or should I be worried that my documents have been lost? I have emailed them but an automated reply said that applications are acknowledged 8 to 10 weeks after receipt, something not in line with what I read in this forum.

Many thanks.

[plabo]

You will have to wait.

[AdInfernos]

You will have to wait.

Quite obvious. Isn't it?

[tallahassee]

Hi fawinds,

I was pretty much in the same situation as you (applied via NCS though) - you can check my timeline in the September thread as well.

While everyone had received their letters within about 2-5 days, I didn't receive anything for 2 weeks. Turned out that the Royal Mail took 8 days to deliver my letters.

However, my payment was taken on time and I realise that yours wasn't, which would worry me too.

Give it another week or so, but you can also try calling the citizenship hotline (can find it via the Gov UK site, although I didn't find them to be very useful...

Fingers crossed that you get all the required letters soon!

[AdInfernos]

Hi fawinds,

I was pretty much in the same situation as you (applied via NCS though) - you can check my timeline in the September thread as well.

While everyone had received their letters within about 2-5 days, I didn't receive anything for 2 weeks. Turned out that the Royal Mail took 8 days to deliver my letters.

However, my payment was taken on time and I realise that yours wasn't, which would worry me too.

Give it another week or so, but you can also try calling the citizenship hotline (can find it via the Gov UK site, although I didn't find them to be very useful...

Fingers crossed that you get all the required letters soon!

Hi tallahassee, thank you for your reply. Yes, I saw your timeline on the other thread and realised your acknowledgement took longer than usual. But is the fact that your payment was taken promptly and mine hasn't been taken yet what worries me.

Anyway I have already emailed them and hopefully someone will get back to me with some information. I've seen that in past months the average wait for the acknowledgement was nearly one month, although that is not the case now.

Probably I'm now at the anxiety stage. If by the middle of the month I haven't heard from them I'll move to the seriously concerned stage

Best of luck with your application

[AdInfernos]

Well, at least today I have an update. There is a pending authorisation for £1282 from "Nationality Directorat" on my credit card, so I guess everything is ok at this stage. Hopefully an acknowledgement will follow within the next few days.

[tallahassee]

There you go - it's all going according to plan. =)

Thanks for the update and good luck to you too!

[AdInfernos]

There you go - it's all going according to plan. =)

Thanks for the update and good luck to you too!

In my opinion postal applications take longer to be initially dealt with. Probably they have to carry out the checks that in other cases are done by the NCS.

Curiously enough I received the acknowledgment and biometrics letter today, but no email at all.

The document here provides an interesting reading: https://www.gov.uk/government/publicati ... ember-2014

On page 32 shortest decision time is just 9 days, average 50, longest 541. This data is from 2014, but my guess it that a lot depends on the assigned caseworker, perhaps some conduct more stringent checks? Who knows.

Anyway, status: awaiting decision

[CR001]

In my opinion postal applications take longer to be initially dealt with. Probably they have to carry out the checks that in other cases are done by the NCS.

There is no difference in NCS or postal. NCS don't do any 'checks', they simply make sure the form is completed and copy your original documents and return these to you. NCS are only a third party agent, like the Post Office check and send for passports.