Referee Acceptable Profession Requirement

[zsragg]

Hi,

I'm planning to apply for Citizenship and have some doubts on Referee's Acceptance Profession Requirement.

I know someone for 3+ years who is a Professional Member of British Computing Socity (MBCS).

Under referee section of this AN form guide https://assets.publishing.service.gov.u ... t_2023.pdf

It links 'professional person' to this page "Countersigning passport applications and photos": https://www.gov.uk/countersigning-passp ... ignatories which doesn't include any mention of "British Computing Society member".

Meanwhile under "General nationality applications: caseworker guidance" https://www.gov.uk/government/publicati ... d-guidance
You can see "British Computer Society (BCS) - professional grades which are Associate (AMBCS), Member (MBCS), Fellow (FBCS)" listed under acceptable professional person.

Q1: I'm confused on which one from above to choose as source of truth? and is it OK/safe to use MBCS as a referee for citizenship application?

Q2: As a backup, I do know someone whose profession is "Engineering Manager" at a tech company which on Google says it's "private limited company", but also has VAT number - so I'm guessing would the title in Referee section say "manager of a VAT-registered company" OR "manager of a limited company"?

Q3: Backup "manager" referee only knew me for a brief period of time (6 months) around more than 3 years ago. Would this be an issue to satisfy requirement: "Each referee must have known you for at least 3 years". I can't say if they know me well and we had no contact for almost 3 years after they left the company. Is it OK/safe to use them as a referee?

[contorted_svy]

Referee 1 should be fine. Manager 2 should also work - they don't have to have known you continuously for 3 years, as far as they can recognise you from your picture and have known you since then.