How a Briton in Vienna chose the citizenship of his host country after the UK Referendum on EU Membership to negate the potential personal consequences of Brexit
Hopefully people have wondered what the reason has been for the radio silence from me. Well, while there has been very little to report, the reason has been due to the fact that after submitting everything that was missing at the same time as I took my citizenship test back just before Christmas, I have since been playing the waiting game. Continue reading “The waiting game is nearly over…”
I came out of my application submission appointment in late October with a date for my citizenship test, which I have next week along with the request to submit a few final pieces of paperwork. Most importantly of course, I have a case number and my application was made with the UK still in the EU.
I’ll still not be convinced that I have submitted everything until I get a formal confirmation through to that effect – given my wife’s experience where her application was held for a year untouched, maybe my unease is somewhat justified, especially as once submitted by my case officer, my paperwork will be passed on to a colleague of the case officer for reviewing.
Continue reading “Completing the jigsaw puzzle – Nachweis über Exekutionen und Pfändungen”
Having spent months trying to gather all the requested information as per the list supplied back in the spring, last Wednesday I went to MA35 in the 20th district, with a lever arch file accompanied by my young son and wife, to put in our applications (for me and my son) for Austrian citizenship. I’d sat up until 2am checking and rechecking that I had as much of the information available as possible, and potential supporting documentation that could also be of use. Despite thorough preparations, I was still nervous. Continue reading “25 October – Application appointment”
Even though my wife and I are at different stages of our naturalisation processes, there are some similarities for both of us. In recent weeks, we have both needed to have documents apostilled. While I was watching Austria vs Serbia playing rugby, I got chatting to another Brit who is in the document gathering process, and he asked me about the ordering for apostille and sworn translation of a document issued from the UK, and so I decided to use this post to clear up their use, and how to get them. Continue reading “Getting apostilles for UK issued documents (and apostilles for Austrian issued ones)”
For my citizenship application I have had to have a UK police record done – and I think it is worth mentioning to those going down the same road, that although it is recommended to have your National Insurance number to hand (for those who may not have needed the number in approaching two decades, and are not aware of it any more, the process to get a new card can take some time!), but if you do not have it, you can still get through the process. Continue reading “Getting the UK equivalent of a Strafregisterauszug”
After a lengthy application process and requests to furnish further documents and having to wait for a citizenship test appointment, my wife was recently issued with the “Bescheid der Zusicherung der Verleihung der österreichischen Staatsbürgerschaft“. For me, that milestone is still a long way off, if anything my immediate concern remains whether the case number (Geschäftszahl) for my application will be issued prior to any “no deal” as the spectre of the United Kingdom walking away from the negotiation table is currently looming as the latest round of negotiations on the UK leaving the EU have failed to progress as far as hoped from all sides. Continue reading “The Beginning of the End or the End of the Beginning”
Among the supporting documentation for my application, as a property owner, I am required to supply a Grundbuchauszug for the property that I own, and the one that I live in. In the past I have got copies of Grundbuchauszüge from my bank, as usually it has been connected with changes to my mortgage, and they have usually given me a photocopy for personal reference. This post will focus on getting the Grundbuchauszug, and the information required as well as what information the entry contains, which might also be of interest to property owners who have not deciphered it. Continue reading “Getting a Grundbuchauszug – without leaving the house”
Before anyone wonders about the punny title, I am not exhorting people to “let me know!”- although it does remind me to reiterate that I am of course interested in hearing about others people’s experiences, and to contact me with questions or information about their experience. Indeed this post draws on someone else’s recent experience. Continue reading “Gib mir Bescheid!”
The CV I am drafting ahead of my citizenship application appointment in October is definitely not intended to land me an out-of-this-world job. It might barely be good enough to set me apart from the crowd in terms of showcasing my skills other than how not to write a CV applying for a job. And while CVs usually should be embellished to within a whisker of containing a lie, in this case it is not. Continue reading “My most important, yet uninspiring, CV”
In a previous post, I already touched upon the citizenship test attached to applying for citizenship – and the citizenship test is not unique to taking Austrian citizenship. The content varies from country-to-country, but this week there was media coverage about the absurd case of a candidate naturalising in Switzerland, who spoke the local dialect and living and working in Aarau (roughly equidistant from Basel and Zürich), but who failed the test. Continue reading “Testing times ahead…”