The up-to-date database resides in Part 2 (link at the bottom of this page).
Above is a link to data we are compiling on Relinquishments and Renunciations — a work in progress. This corresponds with the Consulate Report Directory (in sticky post below), tracking individual experiences for each Consulate, along with a timeline chart.
Note: We are using numbers instead of blog names for this public posting so there will be no compromise of private information. Your facts will help give a snapshot of relinquishment and renunciation activity and where that occurs.
Please submit information in the comments here (or someone can contact you privately). Thanks for all your help on this.
COMMENTS ARE CLOSED FOR Relinquishment and Renunciation Data (as reported on Isaac Brock), Part 1.
Part 2 is now open for your comments. Thank you.
@Calgary,
I think there may be some renunciation/relinquishment cases reported from Israel that are not yet on the spreadsheet. I write this because there may be many more from there to follow due to the banks reportedly not just closing people’s accounts but freezing them as well.
It is hard to imagine anyone having their accounts blocked due to FATCA not shit-canning their US passports.
Thanks, Patrick Henry.
I’ll do a search in Comments to see what comes up for “Israel” — see what I can find and pick them up. I also like to get permission. I am aware of Joseph Zernik, but haven’t entered anything for his renunciation or non-renunciation, whichever it may prove to be.
To Calgary411.
I would like to ask a few short questions but do not wish to have, at this time, everyone read me. I have witten on the IBS site in a very long time.
I will contact you, Greenwood.
Problem with Montreal.
Just received an email from the Montreal consulate tekking me how to,prepare for my first appointment for renunciation after having carefully told them in my first message it was about relinquishment under Immigration and Nationalities Act, s.349(a)(1).
What should I do?
Old&Simple,
Have they given you an appointment or just given you documents to read to prepare for your renunciation (i.e. “Renunciation of US Citizenship”, “Renunciation of U.S. Citizenship by Persons Claiming a Right of Residence in the U.S.”, “Advice about Possible Loss of U.S. Citizenship and Dual Nationality” and “Renunciation Quesionnaire” along with a similar email to what I got initially:
Mine, of course, was for renunciation. But, I would answer the email saying that you will prepare forms 4079 and 4081 and a statement for your claim to relinquishment (vs renunciation) and see what comes back. Let us know.
Other suggestions for Old&Simple from anyone?
The message is very similar to what you show in your post. It looks like a form letter, but it contains the words “Your first appointment is for an initial interview to open a file.” I have my printed appointment confirmation from the automated online .
Below is the draft notnyet sent of my answer tomtheir message. Should I send this?
Draft:
Hello.
As I indicated in my first message, I was not inquiring about renunciation, but about relinquishment under the Immigration and Nationalities Act, s.349(a)(1). This does not require an oath of renunciation as it applies to previous loss of citizenship through an act of relinquishment performed in 1979. This distinction is very important.
I have been informed that this type of request (relinquishment rather than renunciation) for a Certificate of Loss of Nationality is handled with one visit at the consulates in Calgary, Toronto and Halifax, and that the $450 fee does not apply in these cases.
Old&Simple, I suggest that you just ignore the incorrect email from the Montreal consulate. Just download and print the DS-4079 and DS-4081 forms from the web, if you can, and the corresponding instructions. (You can find the forms by a Google or similar web search.) Fill out the DS-4079 form, indicating that you are relinquishing rather than renouncing.
Take along copies of ALL the documentation that you have regarding your acquisition of Canadian citizenship. Also, take your Canadian passport if you have one and any expired US passport(s) that you may have. Provided that you became a Canadian citizen before 2004 and have not carried a US passport, voted in a US election, lived there, worked there, or (ironically) filed tax returns there since then, you have a case that you intended to relinquish your US citizenship when you became a Canadian.
Finally, to get past security at the consulate, be sure NOT to take any electronic devices or anything that wouldn’t be allowed on an airplane.
Best of luck!
Old&Simple,
This is good advice from AnonAnon if you don’t have a long way to go. I would think they will honour your appointment time. Have everything prepared and advise them that you are there to claim your relinquishment, not renunciation. I am right now trying to find an old post regarding a Halifax (I think) lawyer intervening and telling the consulate that he would school them in how to handle a relinquishment. I hope I can find it and post it.
I found it:
Note the successful relinquishments and receipt of CLNs for same now reported here for Halifax: http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2012/03/14/pdf-compilation-of-relinquishment-and-renunciation-data-as-reported-on-isaac-brock/
The reason I would like to clear this up with them before the appointment is that I’m afraid I’ll be dealing with Clerk Clueless who’ll mess up the CLN backdate, or that it’ll be the first of several appointments while theynget themselves sorted out.
Any danger in my draft message?
If they don’t understand, would I be better off making an appointment in Toronto? I’m retired and have thentime for the trip.
Here is the entire message they sent. Note they demand prepayment of the $450.
Thank you for your email.
If you are considering renouncing your U.S. Citizenship it is important to note the act of renouncing U.S. citizenship is irrevocable. For more information regarding renouncing U.S. citizenship please go to: http://travel.state.gov/law/citizenship/citizenship_778.html
Be Prepared – make sure the following forms are duly completed.
· DS-4079 http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/97025.pdf
· DS-4080 http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/81606.pdf
· DS-4081 http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/81607.pdf
· DS-4083 http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/81609.pdf
Your first appointment is for an initial interview to open a file. At this time, please bring with you all proof of your U.S. citizenship such as but not limited to, birth certificate, U.S. passport, U.S. Naturalization certificate, Consular Report of Birth Abroad; and proof of your foreign citizenship, such as but not limited to, Canadian Naturalization certificate, Canadian passport.
If you do indeed decide to pursue a claim of renunciation, you will be required to make a second appointment. For the second interview be prepared to pay the fee of US$450.00 and bring Canada Post prepaid express post envelope (from Montreal to your home address)
For information regarding your tax obligations please refer to:
Unfortunately we do not have an IRS representative in Canada, information is available on their website at http://www.irs.gov.
The general rule is that ALL U.S. citizens/persons, regardless of where they reside are required to file U.S. income taxes. There is a tax treaty in place between Canada (Quebec) and the U.S. and therefore, the taxes you pay in Canada (Quebec) are taken into consideration when filing U.S. income taxes. Please refer to publication 597.
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p597.pdf
I am not a tax specialist and therefore cannot be of further assistance. Please refer to the IRS website indicated above and /or the following link. http://canada.usembassy.gov/consular_services/taxpayer-assistance.html
In addition, below are some useful website in regards to US Citizens abroad.
Pub 54 Tax guide for US Citizens Abroad
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p54.pdf
Foreign Bank Account Report (FBAR) Instructions:
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/draft_fbar_instructions.pdf
FBAR
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f90221.pdf
NEW!! Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) info:
http://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations/article/0,,id=236664,00.html
Voluntary Disclosure Program:
http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=234900,00.html
FINCEN
http://www.fincen.gov
FBAR updates:
http://www.fincen.gov/statutes_regs/guidance/html/reg_fbar.html
On the other hand, if you want to renew your U.S. passport please go to: http://www.consular.canada.usembassy.gov/montreal.asp
Regards,
ACS
Oops! Sorry, just noticed they want the $450 at the second meeting.
@Old&Simple,
I would suggest you to wait for reply from Petros and from Pacifica — perhaps one will be available to do so later today.
It seems to me that the lawyer in Halifax needs to visit each Canadian consulate (perhaps especially Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa especially) and “school” each on how a relinquishment is done.
In the meantime, note that the US tax lawyer I have in Calgary advises that their firm has been working with the Calgary consulate on streamlining the process (and the Calgary consulate is one of the better ones for experiences we have reported at Isaac Brock). They have even been approved to prepare the documents for their clients AND accompany them in the meetings, really not necessary for most but good this is now allowed. This is quite a departure from the former notion of a lawyer accompanying a client going for a renunciation or relinquishment appointment in earlier days, generally not allowed.
If you have committed a potentially relinquishing act with the intent to relinquish your US citizen, then you are already not a citizen, there is no $450 charge, and you are going to the appointment to inform a consular officer that your relinquishment is a fait accompli. You are not going there to ask them permission to renounce or to pay them even 1 cent, much less the unconstitutional $450 dollar fee that they charge you so that you can make your renunciation before a consular official, as if that were service for which you can be charged. You don’t have to pay because you have already lost your citizenship, and you are only going to the Consulate to inform them in writing of your relinquishing act. Know your rights. See my post: http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2011/12/12/relinquish-dont-renounce-if-you-can/
Old and Simple
When I made my appointment for relinquishment in Calgary they sent me this form:
RENUNCIATION QUESTIONNAIRE
IF YOU WISH TO RENOUNCE YOUR U.S. CITIZENSHIP PLEASE PROVIDE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION:
1. YOUR FULL LEGAL NAME (including former names):
2. DATE & PLACE OF BIRTH:
3. SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER:
4. CURRENT LOCAL MAILING ADDRESS:
5. CURRENT TELEPHONE # HOME ____ – ____ – ______ OTHER ____ – ____ – ______
6. LAST ADDRESS IN U.S.
8. DATES OF RESIDENCE IN U.S.
9. ACQUIRED U.S. CITIZENSHIP BY BIRTH IN U.S. OR, ABROAD TO ONE/TWO U.S. PARENTS. (please circle appropriate answer)
10. ACQUIRED U.S. CITIZENSHIP BY NATURALIZATION:
DATE __________________________ PLACE _____________________________________
11. OTHER NATIONALITY: ___________________- DATE ACQUIRED: _______________
12. WILL YOU BE PROVIDING A WRITTEN STATEMENT REGARDING YOUR REASONS FOR RENOUNCING YOUR U.S. CITIZENSHIP? –____ YES ____ NO
(if yes, please attach your written statement)
13. WHEN YOU TAKE THE OATH OF RENUNCIATION WILL YOU
____ SWEAR, OR ____ AFFIRM, TO THE OATH?
I filled it in but crossed out all references to renouncing and wrote in “relinquishing”. They didn’t comment. Prior to the appointment they also sent me the following e-mail :
You should bring the following items to your appointment:
– Evidence of your United States Citizenship. This must be presented at the time of your interview.
– Any U.S. passports (valid or expired),
– If applicable, your Consular Report of Birth Abroad, Certificate of Citizenship/Naturalization.
– You should also provide evidence of your Canadian citizenship to show that you will not become stateless by renouncing your citizenship.
– Due to a recent policy change made by the Department of State, the $450 fee for Renunciation of citizenship is now required at the time of your interview. We can accept US/CDN cash, credit card or U.S. dollar money order, payable to the U.S. Consulate, Calgary. We do not accept checks or debit cards.
– As an option, you may also wish to provide a written statement regarding your reason for renouncing your citizenship.
At the appointment there was no fee mentioned so it seems that they just spit out these forms regardless of whether you are going for a renunciation or relinquishment. Hope this helps.
Old Warrier. You are not renouncing. You are going in to tell them that you gave up (relinquished) your US citizenship years and years ago. Full stop.
That’s it. Please stop futzing about this. Courage. Go in, tell them you gave up your citizenship when you became Canadian and tell them you would like a CLN.
Afterwards you DO NOT need to contact the IRS in any way shape or form.
OR, as we discussed earlier, you are perfectly safe if you do absolutely nothing.
Thanks for the encouragement…I am not about to pay the $450 fee or sign an oath of renunciation or do an FBAR.
But I am tempted to email them back and repeat for the third time that I am coming for relinquishment not renunciation. That may give them time to check with the other consulates or the embassy. I don’t want them to tell me “Gee, we don’t know how to do that. Come back later after we’ve learned how.”
Weren’t the Amercican consuls supposed to have had a meeting recently to clear up their questions on this matter? Seems I saw that on IBS.
@ Old and Simple,
That’s a form e-mail sent by a clerk who probably only sends form e-mails and didn’t/doesn’t read enough of an e-mail to realise that yours needed to be answered more specifically – and that s/he should have routed it to a different employee as s/he obviously didn’t know the subject that the e-mail was about.
FWIW, It’s also an outdated form e-mail at that, since Myst reported two months ago that Montréal is doing renunciations in 1 visit.
I’d just go to the meeting, bringing s. 349 of the Immigration and Nationalities Act and 7 FAM 1250. If the consul doesn’t get it, that I’d relinquished in 1979, I’d show him the relevant sections. I brought such reference documents with me to my meeting, with relevant sections/paragraphs highlighted, just in case I needed them, which I didn’t.
So, I’d just ignore the e-mail and go to the meeting. You’re scheduled to meet with a vice consul that day, and you’ll have your back-up reference material ready.
If you arrive at the meeting and the clerk you see insists that it’s a renunciation – that happened to me at Toronto, of all places – I didn’t make a big deal with the clerk, as I was getting nowhere with her and clerks don’t make those decisions anyway. So I just pleasantly said I’ll ask the vice consul about that. It never even came up with the vice consul, as it was obvious to her as soon as she saw my forms. But with the vice consul, I’d push, push, push, if I had to.
I wouldn’t worry about Clerk Clueless messing up the effective date of your CLN. As far as I know, the vice consul fills in the CLN form – some people have reported seeing them do it whilst they were talking to them, mine didn’t but she was very firm about the date so I wasn’t worried. And regardless of who plugs in the info into the form, it would be the info that vice consul wrote at your meeting.
@ Old&Simple
Those form replies are annoying. I recently did another snail mail request to try to find out the status of my I-407 (abandonment of green card). They sent back my original letter AND the envelope I mailed it in (no idea why) along with a form letter saying they had updated my address as requested (I made no such request) plus the suggestion to check on my green card “application” status online. Now that’s not possible because to do so you have to have a magic number which I do not have (tried the number that was on my green card but that didn’t work). The 800 number mentioned in the reply does work from Canada but all the options on the menu relate to obtaining a green card not ditching it. So you see, they don’t even read snail mail properly, let alone their e-mails. You will do much better in person when you get to your appointment. At least you have a date! And remember we’re rooting for you.
Pacifica, thanks. While googling for 7FAM1250, I discovered 7FAM1220 which seems useful as well.
So, I shall buy a red marker tomorrow, and show up at the appointment with the pertinent sections marked, especially 7 FAM 1228.3 which is found on page 14 of the 7 FAM 1220 pdf:
e. The effective date of loss of nationality is the date of the expatriating act, not the date the CLN is approved.
Old @ Simple,
Glad you caught that typo! — 1220 is very relevant and detailed, really the key FAM for procedure, with 1250 being more of a backgrounder.
Thanks!
Em They really don’t care about your I-407. Neither should you.
@ Duke of Devon
I know they don’t care and that was my final attempt. While I watch actual US citizens walk away with CLNs into a clearer future it looks like I will remain in the muck. Anyway, the USCIS reply was so off the mark that I think I’ll frame it and hang it up in my Back Hall of Shame. Good for nothing more than a head shake. I’ll expect the best — no signifcant treachery from Flaherty — BUT never discount the possibility of the worst — an IRS vendetta against former green card holders.
Question about DS-4079 and affidavit :
I am working on my affidavit and DS 4079. The DS-4079 asks:
13(e) Do you file U.S. income or other tax returns? If yes, please explain.
I will answer no, as the quesion is in the present tense. However, I was married and separated at the time I relinquished (1979), and I know that I filed a joint return with my wife for 1979….and included a letter saying I would no longer file as I had become a Canadian.
For the life of me, I can’t remember whether she asked me for my T4s in the following 4 or 5 years until the divorce, or whether she just filed as single.
So I plan to not mention taxes at all in the affidavit and simply anwer no to the DS-4079 question .
Does this sound OK?
I should have included in my question that my ex maintained her UScitizenship.