goodo

Normally, one can't travel on an expired passport. However, what if you were a dual citizen, so you had a valid passport (country A) to travel on, and were travelling to country B (expired passport)? If it was a country where you must enter the country on that countries passport, or country B required citizens of country A to have a visa to enter, what would happen? They couldn't deny you entry to your own country could they?

thanks
goodo

kykate

I don't think the airlines will let you board without a valid passport & or visa. I believe they incur big $$$ penalties if they deliver someone who is not eligible to enter a country.

Kate

Rejuvenated

They could (and it varies from nation to nation) because you no longer posses the proper documents for them to label you as a citizen of the country. An expired passport is an invalid passport.

chartreuse

Depends on the country. In the UK, the presumption is in favour of the person claiming right of abode, and the onus is on the immigration officer to disprove that claim. I'd be surprised if a simple matter of expiration would meet the standard of proof required.

Globaliser

With respect, I don't think this is right. In the UK, the passenger must prove that he is a British citizen, and the law provides that this should be done with a valid passport. The relevant provisions are sections 3(8) and 3(9) of the Immigration Act 1971, which provide:-And by section 33(1):-However, the strict provisions of the law are one thing, and their practical application is another. Although these documents are the only documents that the immigration officer is obliged to take into account, I'm pretty sure that immigration officers do have a discretion to accept other evidence (including an expired passport). Or the immigration officer may allow the passenger to enter on terms that permit further investigation before a final decision is taken that the passenger is in fact a citizen. If the passenger is a citizen but does not have the legally-prescribed documents to prove it, he has no legal basis for complaining about a further investigation of this nature.

So in the UK, there is no basis for denying a citizen entry to his own country - but the issue is whether the citizen can prove that he is a citizen.

As for airlines being fined, the UK position (as I understand it) is that the airline would not be fined if it can demonstrate that the passenger was boarded when holding correct documents. So if the airline carried a British citizen holding only an expired British passport, and the passenger was refused entry, the airline might be at risk. However, if the passenger also held a valid US passport and had showed that to the airline, the airline should be in the clear, even if the passenger subsequently decided to try to enter using only the expired British passport and never relied on the US passport.

GUWonder

Finland does not require passports for Finnish nationals to come into or leave Finland and the burden is on the state to prove that a Finnish national is not a Finn. I have no idea on how this works in practical terms.

chartreuse

Globaliser, I'd tend to agree with your interpretation of the law. However, I was basing my post on the IND procedural manuals (available here) and in particular the following (my bolding):

3. ON ENTRY
Paragraphs 12 and 13 in Part 1 of HC 395, mirroring section 3(9) of the 1971 Act, require a person seeking to enter the United Kingdom and claiming the right of abode to prove that claim by producing either:
 a passport describing him as a British citizen or as a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies with the right of abode; or
 a certificate of entitlement (see below and ANNEX A) certifying that he has the right of abode

and

3.2. Procedure
When a passenger presents a valid document as noted at paragraph 3 (above) he should, subject to paragraph 2, be accepted immediately as being exempt from control unless the immigration officer has reason to believe or suspect that the passport has been forged or falsified or that the holder has no right to the certificate of entitlement or the "confirmation of right of abode" document. The fact that a passport is out of date does not in itself render it invalid as evidence of nationality and identity, but this fact may justify the immigration officer in continuing his examination until he is satisfied on these points. Note that it is for the Immigration Officer to prove fraud, not for the passenger to disprove it.

3.3. Refusal of entry
A passenger seeking to enter the United Kingdom and claiming to have the right of abode, but who is unable to produce any of the documentary evidence noted in paragraph 3 (above) or is subject to the restrictions on exercise of the right of abode mentioned in paragraph 2, should be treated as subject to control. Such a person should be examined in order to establish whether or not he qualifies for leave to enter. If, for example, he is claiming entry for settlement and the Rules require the production of an entry clearance, then refusal would follow if he is not in possession of such an entry clearance. It should be remembered that the absence of evidence to establish a claim to the right of abode is not, in itself, a ground for refusal of entry.

Agreed, and this is exactly the type of situation the OP raised.

Tartegnin

I can add anecdotally for the US: dual citizens are required to enter the US on their US passport. This rule caused us to really scramble to get our daughter's expired US passport renewed as I could envision all sorts of problems if we tried to enter on her valid UK passport. When I was relating the saga of the passport renewal to a friend in similar circumstances, she said she had recently travelled to the US with her US/UK son with his valid UK passport (this addresses the airline checkin, by the way), but his expired US passport. She presented only the UK passport at immigration, where the officer questioned the UK passport (i.e., "doesn't he have a US passport") as my friend is US. She explained, and he reiterated the law that you must enter on a US passport - he then said that a US citizen would never be denied entry, even on an expire passport.

I wouldn't want to rely on this, frankly, although if you could address the airline check in issue (you'd really have to have a dual citizenship, I think, to get on the plane with a valid passport - I recently mistakenly took an expired US passport to the airport and was denied check in on an intra-Europe flight), I do believe you'd eventually make it into the US - but I can imagine being taken aside for questioning first.

rick253

For Australia you would need your Australian passport to return.
If you tried to re-enter with your "foreign" passport that would need a re-entry visa.
Personally I wouldn't take any chances with re entering Australia without a current Australian passport.
After all there are so many detention centres awaiting your patronage!!!!

Globaliser

In which case, I think we agree about all of this.

If the immigration officer goes as far as to assert fraud, then the burden is indeed on the immigration officer to prove it.

I think that the last piece of bolding refers to the fact that a person who can't prove that he is a British citizen may still qualify for admission in some other capacity, for example, as a foreign national visitor. If he does so qualify, he should be admitted in that category even if he has tried and failed to prove that he is a British citizen. However, I suspect that in practice it would be a rare case in which a passenger tried and failed in circumstances that did not immediately call into question his bona fides, leading to a proper refusal of entry in any other capacity.

philipperv

If this is true, what would stop anyone from claiming Finnish nationality upon entry into Finland?

Globaliser

Timatic says:-So it looks like you have to have something, just not necessarily a passport. But then that just works in a similar way to the US concession for local travel on a birth certificate plus photo ID, commonly used by cruise passengers.

meiji

I think the hard part would be getting on a plane but if, as has been mentioned, the person flying boards with a valid passport from one country then tries to enter another with an expired passport of the arrival country they'd probably be fine. I'm almost tempted to try it, but I won't.

roundtheworld

Normally once you are in your hoe country they grant you access, once it is estaboshed that you are a citizen.

Friend of mine had left the US without her passport, and came back realizing it.

2 hours in secondary and she was fine.

Same in most European countries, if you have made it to the o****ry they legally CANNOT send you back. They need to establish if you are a citizen.

This is the problem with the asylum seekers who flush their documents. They cannot be send back, becasue their home country cannot determined. Soem countries do send them back to the port of origin, but legally very difficult.

roundtheworld

Wokrs its just a hassle...