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Registering my daughter in the UK. Worth it?

ManWithAPlan

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19 Aug 2014
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My daughter was born a few weeks back, and while we have done all the necessary steps to get her registered and in the system in Japan, I haven't done a thing to get her registered back in the UK yet.

I looked through the process on the UK embassy website and there are a list of requirements that need to be filled before she can be registered. Most of them are easy enough to obtain, but there are quite a few pieces of evidence required.

Then, right at the top of the list of documents it says "Send English translations of all foreign documents. Use a professional translator and include their name and address with your application. Don't send laminated documents." I have counted at least 4 documents are going to be needed to be translated 'professionally'. My wife and I could do this ourselves, so I am not sure if that is an option.

My question is, is it worth going through all that trouble of doing it? We don't have any immediate plans to return to the UK anytime soon, and it's made very clear that it is entirely optional. so, what are the benefits of doing it? Would it be easier to just to get her a UK passport instead?
 
Thanks for the links. I saw that thread, but I am personally more interested in whether or not people think it's worth jumping through all the hoops to do it.

Dotanbatan, you said you did it over 20 years ago, right? Has it been worth doing it for you? All the pros seem to relate to just having a UK birth certicate, and it being useful to do it if you move back to the UK.
 
I don't think you receive a UK Birth Certificate as such, rather it's registered and the child can be issued with a British passport. I may be wrong though, as we decided not to go through this process in Japan.
We registered the births in the UK for the sake of both the children and more importantly, our future grandchildren.
With the way this old world of ours is turning out, having British citizenship guaranteed was something we wanted to ensure for them ..... the U.K will hopefully stay a relatively safe and stable place to live within their lifetimes.
Check this with them, but if you do register your daughter here, (if the system is still the same as when we inquired) her children will not 'automatically' be eligible for British citizenship on a hereditary basis.

If your worry is about receiving emergency assistance from the British govt while living in Japan, I'm sure your dependents are listed with you ... so their basic details are recorded and they will be included.
 
Checked the passport service - applying for a passport for her if you don't have a birth certificate issued by an embassy requires probably pretty much the same number of documents and the same translation issues.

re:translation, they say "member of a recognised professional organisation" but don't say the translator can't be related - still, I would check before submitting. If you get anything wrong they generally bounce the application and keep the fee.

You won't need to redo those translated documents if renewing with her old passport, but if it's lost/stolen, you'd have to redo everything from scratch. The embassy registration is something of a shortcut there.

(source: my own struggles with the b*st*rds at the Home Office. p.s. oh lordy is it May 7 yet?)
 
Thanks for the information!

It seems that it's going to be as much of a hassle getting her a passport as it is getting her registered then. It's good to know that once those documents are translated then that is something we won't have to do again unless we lose her passport, which I really hope we don't do.

I guess in the case of wrong translations it would be better for us to get it done professionally and not do it ourselves considering the application fee will probably cost more than the translation fees anyway.

I am still on the fence about whether getting her registered in the UK is even something worth doing. I think, if we were planning on returning to the UK at some point it would be a good idea to do it, but due to the current climate in the UK with the tough immigration rules it doesn't look like us moving back is something we are realistically going to do anyway, but I thought it would be good for her to be registered in the UK. Whether that means doing it from here or trying to do it while back on vacation.

Correct me if I am mistaken, but I believe with the current system it would mean that my daughter will have to choose with nationality to go with once she reaches 20 anyway, but I also believe that you can resume your British nationality if you decide to give it up but want to resume it again.

I honestly am just unsure of why it's even worth the hassle of doing it. Is it something that must be done as soon as she is born, or is possible to register a birth when she is older?
 
You can "register" her as a British citizen at any point, as she can claim nationality through you:
Register as a British citizen - GOV.UK

It's basically like a simplified naturalisation process.

Note: cost for a child for that is £749, I don't know what getting an embassy certificate costs but it may be cheaper to go that route and use that to simplify the passport application and any other official processes which require a birth certificate.

My personal instinct would be to get the birth certificate done just because it will make any later dealings easier.
 
That's pretty much the way I am leaning at the moment. If things change here it'll make things easier later if I have it all sorted out now.

I am still trying to explain to my wife why we should do it other than so that she can claim British Citizenship. We'll probably stay in Japan for the future, so while her having the option of being a British Citizen in the future is a good reason, it's still something that could be done further down the line if the situation arises where it would be worth doing it.

This is such a pain to do in contrast to other countries, like America. An American friend of mine went to his embassy and walked out with citizenship and a passport, for less than $200.
 
If there's even the slimmest chance that in five or ten years your situation will change, it's probably worth it.

While it's likely that she would still be able to do everything later on, it's also quite likely that doing things later on will make it more expensive and/or complicated.
 
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