Consulate Report Directory (Brockers Describe their Consulate Meetings) and CLN Delivery Time Chart Part 2
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Wonder what really happens at the consulates? Find out in the Isaac Brock Society’s Consulate Report Directory, currently 279 pages of first-hand accounts of renunciation/relinquishment appointments, arranged by consulate location, along with further information and links to the required Dept of State forms and the Dept of State manuals used by the consulates in processing CLN applications, with an appendix containing a timeline chart (booking-meeting-CLN) as reported by consulate location.
The Directory is updated as consulate visit stories are posted on the website.
You can post here or elsewhere on the site (we’ll keep an eye out for them). Some comments may be excerpted or condensed slightly in the consulate reports. The original posts and comments remain on their threads are not edited.
Thanks to everyone for sharing your experiences…and keep ’em coming! It’s a new experience for everyone and your information is really helpful.
To change or delete your report in the Directory, you can post the change as a comment on this thread or e-mail Pacifica@isaacbrocksociety.ca
Click here for the Consulate Report Directory
Notes:
Consulates are listed alphabetically by country and the Directory’s table of contents links to each section (they don’t look like links, but they are.)
This thread is a continuation of Consulate Report Directory Part 1, which contains earlier discussion on this topic, 929 comments from its inception in March 2012 through February 2013.
To Book an Appointment and/or Request Information from your Local Consulate:
This post by Eric, Almost No US Citizenship Renunciation Appointments Left During 2016 in Dublin, contains a chart of links to the consulates’ website pages on renunciation/relinquishment, for info on booking appointments and/or requesting information at your location. (The title highlights Dublin, but the charts, article and discussion cover consulates around the world.)
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Re Ottawan’s renounciation:
Wouldn’t the fact that Ottawan was a Canadian citizen from birth exempt him/her from any exit tax, thus making the question of exit tax thresholds moot?
Yes but. The income and net worth thresholds don’t apply. however they still demand 5 yrs. worth of tax returns.
@tdott
From my understanding of the exit tax rules, you are correct in that I had citizenship in Canada fom birth, I continue to reside in Canada and pay taxes in Canada. These factors exempt me from being a covered expatriate for purposes of the exit tax, but I still must file the 8854 and certify that I am tax compliant for the past five years to be exempted from the exit tax. I have brought myself into compliance with the IRS and there I should be fine as long as I file the final tax and FBAR returns as well as the 8854. I know I am fortunate in this regard.
@ Ottawan,
Congratulations on your renunciation! Thanks very much for your detailed report on consulate meeting!
I’m glad to hear it went very smoothly and pleasantly I always am glad to hear that – but doubly so in this case!
Your report is really significant because Ottawa was in a class by itself when it came to horror stories and we never heard anything that could be construed as positive about the place. I, myself, was at both Ottawa and Toronto last year, and got the sense they represented two different countries.
As editor of the Consulate Report Directory, I began to hear positive rumours about Ottawa about two months ago and read of a positive meeting last month at Maple Sandbox and I’ve made some mention of that here at Brock.
But yours is the first concrete report Brock has gotten evidencing that significant changes have occurred at Ottawa!
And they are significant! Ottawa no longer takes over a year from booking to completion, amongst other things, such as going from “Bizarre irregularities, some more reminiscent of a Dragnet movie than a consulate” in 2012 to “The officials were professional, polite and were not confrontational” in 2013.
I’ll add your report to the directory tomorrow and update the intro to the Ottawa section as well. I think we have enough evidence now to lift the “travel advisory” we’ve had on Ottawa.
This is terrific!
@Old and Simple,
Thanks for keeping us up to date on your communications. That sounds very frustrating dealing with Montréal. It’s a sad sign, too, I’m not sure what’s with them as they used to be a fine place to deal with, but, boy, are they coming across like thickheads about relinquishment. And also some other new weirdness there like changing from 1 visit to 2 visits. Never heard of a consulate changing in that direction.
I will be putting out a new edition of the Consulate Report Directory tomorrow and make mention of these changes in the Montréal section.
Thanks for all the input you shared here whilst preparing your case and also the useful information you’ve pulled out of the FAMs!
And thanks for your offer to translate when Brock has a press release — it would be great to get the word out more in Québec!
@Ottawan
I would like to thank you as well for your very detailed report on your experience at the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa. I also live in Ottawa and will be relinquishing, though I’m still not entirely sure where. It’s encouraging to hear that the staff in Ottawa is now behaving in a more professional and civilized manner than has been previously reported.
Some good news at last regarding my relinquishment file and the 2nd appointment with the Vancouver Consulate – I had my first appointment in September, 2012. Some of you might remember that several of my original documents were not accepted (as reported in the directory). New documents were obtained and emailed to the consulate in early October. In December I was contacted by the consulate and told that my second appointment would not occur until October, 2013 (more than one year after my first).
With the assistance of others on IBS, there was contact made with Ms. S.D. Johnson in Ottawa and she requested my patience and said that efforts were being made to move appointments forward in Vancouver. Well great news, at last, because I was contacted this week by a most polite person at the Consulate here in Vancouver and my appointment has been moved up to April. The relief is immense.
Hopefully, this is a sign that the bottleneck at Vancouver is easing and perhaps more appointments will open up. I do believe the consulate here with the support of Ms. Johnson are trying to assist and move things along.
As I am a ‘relinquisher’ from more than 40 years ago and actually swore a ‘renunciatory oath’ when I became a Canadian, my case should be straight forward. Nothing has ever been done to negate the intention of relinquishing my U.S. citizenship in 1972. It will be so good to finally be able to put this dark, horrific chapter of my life behind me.
Thank you so much to all the support I have found on this site. Most especially, thank you to Calgary and Pacifica. Without the two of you, I don’t think I would get through this.
@Tiger
That’s wonderful news. I often think of the long .long wait you’ve had. I’m really happy for you.
Thanks hijacked,
Our appointments were so close together and you have the much desired CLN. Hopefully, I will soon join that ‘Elite’ group.
@Tiger,
Yes! I am so delighted that finally Vancouver is moving on getting your filed closed! I hope, too, that their moving your meeting up to a more reasonable date portends well for others, too. What with you not being a USC for 40 years (probably longer than most USCs have been alive) and them putting you off with their unique quadruple document requirement, this must have been an incredibly frustrating experience as you just try to get back the status quo that was stolen from you. So, I am really happy!
This horrific chapter of your life is almost over now and you will be able to move on – as yourself, as the normal Canadian person you are, not trapped in this byzantine or whatever-the-word-is American weirdness.
Tiger
Congratulations — that’s good news. I don’t know what has been going on in Vancouver, but my guess is they just got swamped. I have a contact in that consulate who is an old friend, and I’m hoping to get some insight into what’s happening there in a couple of weeks time. I’ll post whatever I find out.
Wow — my sincere congratulations!!! As you know, I couldn’t be happier for your getting that appointment moved up by 1/2 year. Your Vancouver Consulate story has been the most absurd reported at Isaac Brock.
A special thank you and gratitude from me to Sylvia D. Johnson, Consul General at the Ottawa Embassy, for her intervention in your case. (…and it was an honour to be on your team, tiger!)
May this be behind you before you know it so you can get on with more important things in your life!
That’s great news, Tiger. I hope it’s broken the log jam for others in Vancouver, too.
I went to the Vancouver consulate for my first meeting today. Stuffed with people seeking visas and crying babies, the place was hot with human sweat (they must be understaffed and need a bigger place). It took me two hours although the two that interviewed me were professional. They only took form DS4079 and DS4081. I have my second interview on Sept 6. The one new thing Brockers might be curious about it Van consulate was totally overbooked for 2nd interviews. The first person I talked to (who reviewed my forms) said 2nd interviews were booked into 2014 until recently. They speeded up things twice so that now I get Sept 6 for my day of liberation (isn’t this funny that USA is supposed to be about liberty).
The unique thing about today, is that I was reading the article in the Economist and was interrupted while reading it to talk to the second officer (who was entirely professional). I showed him the article and he said he should read it. I think I know more than them. He then believed my answer about why I should renounce (btw this is not required you can say nothing). Dual citizenship is just too complicated. Today I loved the mountain snow and the Canadian people. See below.
Dual citizenship in Germany
Jus sanguinis revisited
How not to treat people with more than one passport
Mar 2nd 2013 | BERLIN |From the print edition
Backing Turkey and Germany together
THE case of a woman from Hanau, in Hesse, shows why Kenan Kolat, leader of Germany’s Turks, calls the German citizenship law “absurdity cubed.” Born in Germany to Turkish parents, she was a dual citizen. According to the law, she had to relinquish one passport between her 18th and 23rd birthday. She chose to forgo the Turkish one. But the Turkish bureaucracy was slow, her birthday came—and her German citizenship went instead.
International law has never fully embraced multiple citizenship. Many countries frown on it, though others take a more relaxed attitude. Germany, however, manages to make it especially complicated for citizens of foreign origin. Its traditional approach goes back to a law passed before the first world war. Based on jus sanguinis (“right of blood”), it gave citizenship to anybody of German descent, but not to foreigners born in Germany, as countries such as America and France that practise jus soli (“right of soil”) do. Then, in 1999, a centre-left government added the two notions together. This would have let a woman born in Germany to Turkish parents be simultaneously German and Turkish. But that law coincided with a regional election in Hesse, where the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) seized on the issue to mobilise its conservative base in opposition. The CDU won the state and took control of the upper house, where it blocked the new law.
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A compromise was reached in 2000. Children born in Germany to foreign parents after 1990 can get two passports but have to choose one citizenship before they are 23. This year, the first cohort of such children, about 3,300, reach that age. From 2018 the number will reach 40,000 a year or more. There are about half a million such cases all told, more than two-thirds of them of Turkish descent.
Yet not all young dual citizens must choose. A child born to a German parent in America, say, retains both passports for life. So does a child born to a Greek or Spanish parent in Germany, because dual citizenship is allowed for members of the European Union and Switzerland. This seems unfair to the Turks. This week Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, said as much to Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor, during her visit to Turkey. (Mrs Merkel also explained that, though happy for Turkey’s EU accession talks to continue, she retained her “scepticism” about its ever becoming a member.)
Besides being unjust and creating two classes of citizens, the law is a nightmare to administer, says Ulrich Kober at Bertelsmann Stiftung, a think-tank. Because countries like Iran do not let citizens renounce their citizenship and others make it costly or difficult, German law in theory grants exceptions. But the rules are not clear, reckons Kay Hailbronner, a lawyer. To make the decisions even more arbitrary, the 16 German states process the paperwork, and each uses different forms.
What better way to irritate those citizens whom Germany’s politicians say they want to integrate? Mr Kober thinks Germany should simply allow dual citizenship. So do the centre-left parties hoping to replace Mrs Merkel’s government in September’s election, as well as the CDU’s coalition partner, the Free Democratic Party. It may yet happen.
@Kermitzii,
Congratulations on the completion of your first appointment in Vancouver. Yes, the bottleneck at Vancouver seems to be breaking up and 2nd appointments are not delayed as long as they once were. I recently had my appointment booked for October, 2013 moved forward to April.
This could all be good news for some individuals unable to travel to another part of Canada to obtain their CLN.
I have been following the bookings at the Halifax Consulate as I intend to renounce in the near future.
I actually had an appointment in January, but had to cancel until I could get further financial advice.
There is something odd happening there, and I wonder if any Brockers may know what is going on.
No appointments have been posted for March under “notarial and other services”. I have been looking at this since early February on a daily basis, and none have been posted.
There are lots of appointments for “passport services”, 29 at last count, but none for the category that includes renunciation. This is quite a deviation from the past. There were always appointments posted monthly for notarial services.
Could this be the result of sequestration? Any other more theories?
I note that March is fully booked (slots spread over 7 days) for the Toronto consulate, and that April’s slots are more limited . That is a significant drop from several previous months, where I remember that I was happy to see that there were >100, (or I think, even up to aprox. 200) spots available vs. the limited 49 slots (spread over only 4 days) now for April.
A Brocker might be able to confirm the drop in number of slots available. I had posted it for Toronto a few times at the end of 2012, but can’t find it now.
@Kermitzii,
Thank you for the report on your Vancouver Consulate first appointment and congratulations.
That your second appointment won’t take place until September and that some second appointments for Vancouver were booked into 2014 until recently is foolish when other consulates are effectively freeing people from the bonds of US citizenship with only one appoitment. That everyone booking for any US consulate in Canada (or elsewhere in the world) is subjected to the whims of local consulate administration rather than a set-out standard of procedure that makes sense is unjust and incomprehensible.
@ Kermitzii,
Congratulations on getting your renunciation underway! Thanks very much for sharing your information on the Vancouver Consulate.
Yeah, Vancouver is being really stubborn or something about this. They were told in November, as were all consulates in Canada, that they could switch to doing only 1 visit. I noticed that Toronto switched to 1 around that time. Although some consulates had already switched to 1 visit, I think some consulates may have been reluctant to switch to 1 because the procedure manual doesn’t explicitly say it can be done in one visit. But the consulates in Canada were told in November that’s it’s okay.
People are going to want to renounce anyway, because they want to live normal lives. So, it’s not going to stop anyone, just create anguish if it’s prolonged needlessly. And it will just make the US look bad anyway as the wait lists get longer and longer and the media starts picking up that it takes years to get an appointment to renounce (which it will at this rate). If one role of a State Dept is being sort of the PR dept for a country, it’s a dumb strategy.
@Badger,
I was tracking Toronto for several months in late 2012, early 2013. Toronto seemed to be offering 176 or 192 appointments per month, 16 appointments per day, usually 3 days a week, possibly some 4 days/week. I don’t remember over 200/month, but I think it possible — I’m quite sure I recorded 176 and 192, though. It looks really strange to see such an empty calendar at Toronto.
@Titus,
Maybe try e-mailing them. I picked this up from Hazy’s consulate report (2012.11) I think Calgary uses e-mail instead of on-line booking. Maybe Halifax is doing that now? I hope that’s it.
HOw weird On line, Calgary appears to have 100 spots in march 2013 That’s this month folks. What does Calgary have that Vancouver doesn’t?. Besides sunshine.
@pacifica 777.
Thanks for the tip. I think email would be the way to go. I was trying to be a dutiful Canadian and follow the procedure described for booking appointments, but if they are being awkward, then I’ll email them.
I still think there is something strange going on at the Halifax Consulate…
It is a beautiful sunny day in Calgary, KalC.
Calgary has a different procedure from, what I observe, any other of the Canadian consulates. I found their procedure to be very efficient and common sense. One appointment required for both relinquishments and renunciations (unless, I presume, they detect a problem) — a questionnaire sent to you beforehand for pertinent information, returned to them by fax or pdf, so they have all paperwork ready to go for your ONE appointment required there. All very straight-forward and respectful of time and the people they are serving.
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/consulate2/comment-page-1/#comment-193023
VS booking online for all the other consulates in Canada.
You people thanks for you comments and encouragement. I am happy with what I am doing and feel I am making progress in my life. An update from my visit to the consulate yesterday. I have a colleague at McGill U who is American and his wife is too. They had their first appointment over a year ago but now they are getting cold feet. My friend says “I haven’t made my second appointment yet. xxx is having second thoughts, mainly because she thinks it might be a good idea to be eligible for Medicaid when we turn 65. Perhaps she will change her mind after trying, this time on our own (w/o accountant) to file returns for US taxes, FBARs, etc. for 2012. ” It seems life is complicated when both are from USA. I am proud that my wife is Canadian true and blue and would never move to the USA. Also at the consulate, they said there was no problem with my kids (who I declared foreign birth, I don’t know why, I guess it was before the IRS became draconian). When I renounce, the kids can still move to USA, and of course, file their taxes every year to the IRS even if they never live in USA.