If you arrive here through an old link, please click here for the Current Thread.
Wonder what really happens at the consulates? Find out in the Isaac Brock Society’s Consulate Report Directory, currently 274 pages of first-hand accounts of renunciation/relinquishment appointments, arranged by consulate location, along with links to further information and the required Dept of State forms.
Reports are 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
2013.02.12. As of today, this discussion now continues at Part 2. Please click here to go to Consulate Report Directory (Brockers describe their Consulate Meetings) Part 2.
Congratulations Don! Glad to hear all went well! Specially nice to hear your good news as I’ve been following your posts since way back last autumn on the old forum, have
been quite interested in your European perspective on the US mess.
Thanks for sharing your story. I’ve added it, the parts about the procedure itself, to the directory. If you’d like to revise it, add to it, or delete it at any time, you can post it here as a comment or write to my email address at the bottom of the original post.
*@ A broken man
Yes, it took me a while. I cancelled my second appt and gave it a month. It certainly was a heart-breaking decision to make but one that had to be done.
Am curious, were you able to hear anything that might have been said that upset the woman? I would be surprised that anyone hassled her but just wonder…….
@Just a Canadian and @ nobledreamer – I called the IRS numerous times about my tax returns and my records were usually accessed quickly using my SSN. Then about 6 months after I renounced I was told “That SSN is invalid.” I had to call a week later and it was still invalid hence I assumed my CLN had been completed and then I got the letter from the Consulate confirming it was done!
@Peg11,
Do you actually have your CLN in hand yet? If so, could you let us know the date; i.e. is it the same as your renunciation appointment in Calgary? Thanks a lot!
*@nobledreamer –
No. As far as I can tell she just wanted to talk about the frustrating tax issues we talk about here, and the consul was a real live representative of the government which was creating the problems.
Like others here, I found the Toronto consulate very professional and nonjudgemental about renunciation.
@newb
Exactly my thoughts – You’ve summed up everything perfectly. It did indeed feel bittersweet for a couple of days after my appointment last week, but I am now very much of the opinion that that was the right choice to make in order to get on with my life. Just waiting for that magic CLN now!
My CLN is in hand!
Many thanks to the many members here and at the previous forum for your help on my “do-it-yourself” 6 years of IRS returns and FBARs plus the Opt-Out of OVDI! I do have one call to make to the IRS as my 2011 was under examination but it was a straight-forward return so I highly doubt I will be audited and so be it if they do because I declared everything.
@nobledreamer – the CLN states “she thereby expatriated herself on ___” which was dated the date of my renunciation. The date on the “Approved on ____” is hand-written and was 6 months less a day after I renounced. It was a month after that “approved on” date that I got the letter from the Consulate asking for my $450. Then 9 days after I sent the money by registered mail, I received the CLN by double registered mail (requires a signature).
@Peg11
What a great Canada Day celebration you will have. Congrats.
@Peg,
Congratulations once again — glad it is in hand. Will update the Renounce & Relinquish database with your fine information.
And, yes, Happy, Happy Canada Day!!!!
*@ Peg
I couldn’t be happier about your news! And so glad you will truly be able to celebrate an extra-special Canada Day.
Thanks for those details. I actually called Mrs. A’s extension (knowing she’s gone but hoping someone else would be at that number). The message is the same, with her voice and I hoped, just for a second, that she would not have left and would be phoning me back. This was two days ago and so far, nada.
I think of you so often while I struggle to read/digest the Income Tax Act (CDN) in my tax class. What is noticeable is that the text is about the same as a large phone book compared to the monstrous 72,000+ pages of the IRS Code. For those who are newer, Peg was our resident “interpreter” (on the old forum) as we tried our best to decipher what was in the forms, instructions, rules, etc. She was really great at it! 😉
Peg, I am so happy for you! And right in time for your Canada Day party!
Many thanks to you for the info and advice you’ve been sharing, right from those early days on the old forum, such as figuring out how to deal with the convoluted tax forms and you were the first to eludicdate us on what really happens at a renunciation meeting way back last autumn when it was still rather mysterious to us all, which I really appreciated!
*Independence Day (or maybe that will be when the CLN arrives; anyway, I’m writing on July 4)
Toronto Consulate Visit Report
I went to the Toronto consulate recently to apply for a Certificate of Loss of Nationality to document my relinquishment of US citizenship upon having become a Canadian citizen many years ago.
I had filled out forms DS-4079 and DS-4081 in advance. I also took my last US passport (long expired, from just before I came to Canada), copies of my landed-immigrant papers, and a copy of my Canadian citizenship certificate from the 1970s.
My current Canadian passport served as photo ID for entry to the consulate. (The consular official made a copy of it.) To verify that I had an appointment, I needed the receipt page that I had printed after booking the appointment on the consulate’s.web site.
In addition to the forms already mentioned, the consular official asked me to fill out a short form giving my current address and phone number in Canada, my last US address, and my US Social Security Number. An acquaintance in similar circumstances had told me they would want the last two of those; otherwise I wouldn’t have remembered them. I assume they want that information to check whether I have remained on a voter registration roll at my last US address and what my filing status is with the IRS, both of which are material to the question of whether I have been exercising US citizenship. (I haven’t been.) And I believe they want the SSN in order to report my relinquishment to the IRS, as, I understand, the Department of State is now required to do.
The consular official asked me the reason why I was coming forward now (because of news that I would need a CLN to allow me to visit the US on my Canadian passport), I was also asked to confirm all of the particulars on the DS-4079 and DS-4081 forms. After that, we both signed our lines on the forms, and I was sent on my way. The official said it would take many months for the CLN to arrive. I was not given copies of any of the signed documents but was told that I would get copies when the CLN was delivered. There was no indication that I would need another appointment at the consulate.
As others have reported, the official was businesslike. But the decor was drab and there was a gloom of security in the building. It was, I imagine, like visiting a prison. The security people at the entrance provided a way to check in cell phones and retrieve them upon exit, but all other banned items, including water bottles, had to be left outside with a friend or “under the tree”. (There were, indeed, quite a few water bottles at the base of a big tree just outside the entrance.)
I found the consular visit tolerable (it took about an hour, including a lot of waiting), but the whole process of learning what was required, collecting and copying documents, filling the DS forms, and waiting weeks for the appointment has been very time-consuming and annoying for someone who has not been a US citizen for so long. I am in no mood to do any more time-consuming paperwork for the US government if they should ask me to. I am very happy to be purely Canadian and have been for over 30 years.
Thanks to those of you at the Isaac Brock Society who have provided much useful information and advice.
AnonAnon, July 4, 2012
@AnonAnon: Happy Independence Day!
Here’s an interesting and rather amusing account of a former Swiss citizen becoming a British citizen and there are some good comments by Eido Inoue below the article too.
http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/07/02/confessions-of-an-immigrant-knowledge-of-life-in-the-uk/
Thank you for sharing your experience, AnonAnon. I’ll put it in the Directory tomorrow. Glad that Brock has been useful to you and thanks for your contribution!
Would you like to let us know in what month your booked your appointment and what month your appointment was in, so that Calgary411 could add it to the Relinquishment and Renunciation timeline database?
*pacifica777, I booked my appointment in May. The appointment was a bit over a month later, in June.
I will let you know when the CLN arrives or I hear something more from the US. Meanwhile, I will try to put all this out of my mind.
Congratulations AnonAnon. So sorry you had to go to all that trouble but that CLN is a must have. Disappointing to hear they are still saying it will be many months…Especially after the quick appearances for those in Calgary.
*Out of curiosity, I have a question for my upcoming visit for renunciation. I file my US taxes every year, not as a desire to retain citizenship with the US, but to keep legal (technically it is illegal not to file). When I fill out my renunciation paperwork, I don’t want it interpreted that I file US taxes in an attempt to retain US citizeship. What would you guys recommend to put in that box so not to miscontrue my intentions? I want my CLN approved and don’t want to give Uncle Sam any reason to deny my renunciation.
I wrote the following answer to that question (13e, what ties do you retain with the United States, Do you file US income or other tax returns, if yes please explain):
Of course, this answer doesn’t really matter if you renounce, because this is a before the potentially relinquishing act, which takes place in the Consulate when you take the oath of renunciation. It’s what you do afterwards that matters in that case. The form (DS 4079) is trying to cover all bases. It is not trying to determine if you pay taxes except as it relates to the citizenship. If you pay taxes after a relinquishing act, it may be an indication that you intended on keeping your citizenship.
@ Petros… Thanks for the advice… it makes sense… I will put something similar to that on my form.
New Report: John Smith posted a detailed report of his Vancouver renunciation appointment on the Relinquishment and Renunciation Questions thread (July 13, 9:58 pm), also available in the Consulate Report Directory.
Halifax has come through! My wife and I received our CLNs today. It has been 25 weeks to the day since our appointments at the US Consulate in Halifax. My birthday is this Thursday and this is the best gift I could have gotten.
I have to say thank you to everyone here. The information I found here made it possible to consider applying and the support and encouragement gave us the push we needed. Thank you all so much.
John Gahagan
I should also add that they state we performed our expatriating acts in 1973. Also they came registered mail requiring a signature but there was a return address showing the envelope was from the US Consulate in Halifax. Both CLNs were in the one envelope.
@John,
Your full name, wow! Thanks for sharing your wonderful news for the Halifax US Consulate. The Relinquish and Renounce database is updated and it sure looks nice highlighted there in yellow at the top of the page. Congratulations. Thanks for taking part here!!! And, a very happy birthday celebration on Thursday.
Happy Birthday To You. Happy Birthday To You. Happy Birthday Dear John. Happy Birthday To You!
Celebrate big time!