Billy Mumphrey

My children are dual US and Swedish citizens. We are planning to visit Sweden in July. Normally we use their Swedish passports to enter the EU/Schengen immigration, but in this case their Swedish passports will expire during our trip without any possibility of renewing them beforehand. If we use their valid Swedish passport to enter immigration, will we have issues exiting on expired Swedish passports? As a dual citizen myself I know we can't just use the US passports to exit because they would be looking for a stamp that doesn't exit.

GUWonder

I have been flying out of the Schengen area with travel party members whose US passports had no Schengen entry stamp. Depending on when the US passport was issued, some Schengen passport control staff won’t even ask about it. The two issues to be considered are if they will accept the expired Swedish passport as proof of not having overstayed — although technically if you’re exiting Schengen out of Sweden (or even an
NPU country), they should be able to figure it out anyway given the national citizen registries — and that the children aren’t being “kidnapped” away from a custodial parent/guardian.

While getting Swedish passport appointments with the police has gotten very hard in the past twelve months, recently they have been ramping up appointment slot availability, so you may want to keep looking. From in-person appointment at passport-handling police stations to passport pick-up seems to still be well under 2-3 weeks.

Billy Mumphrey

Thanks, probably just easier to use the US passports both on the way in and out to avoid a stamp/overstay issue.

We actually already have passport appointments for them during our trip, but we won't be able to use them because of a new Swedish law we just found out about. Every foreign-born citizen is given a coordination number, or samordningsnummer, but the new law states it now expires every five years and they will have to take some extra administrative steps (appearing in a government office in person with IDs and a bunch of forms) in order to reactivate them. So basically we won't be able to complete all that before their existing renewal appointments, and a passport can only be issued with an active samordningsnummer. I do find it interesting that Swedish citizens are granted different rights depending on where they were born.

miamiflyer8

They will definitely let you into Sweden but exiting will be difficult as the Swedish border guard is very strict on passport validity on the way out. You can try to go to the police station and get the pink emergency passports for the sake of exiting, but they are pricy. Do note that this will be one of the last times you can use the US passports to enter Schengen, given the introduction of ETIAS which will require a fee, so you would need to get the Swedish passport done at one point.

As a Swedish citizen living in the US myself, I can feel the pain. Back in the day, any honorary consulate was able to give you a 10yr passport for $65. Then, Carl Bildt turned it all upside down by cutting the validity and then leaving only NYC, DC and LA as the only passport offices. LA was cut about 10 years ago so now you only have two offices on the same coast and not too far apart. Not to mention the exorbitant ~$226 fee, and you have to pick it up in person. So what I've been doing is renewing it in Sweden and then picking it up in Atlanta as at least you save the fees. Then, this year we have the chaos with appointments, lack of materials and they can't even print the damn booklets correctly. Names have been mixed up, cities misspelled, it is EMBARRASSING.

Now, to add insult to injury, you must have a form of two factor authentication to get an appointment: Either a bank log in or a "Freja" eID card. I no longer have a Swedish bank account, so I tried registering for Freja. Easy enough, but go figure if you've been more than 3yrs outside Sweden you cannot use it to log onto the appointment site. So now the only solution is to call the Swedish police at the crack of dawn (US eastern time) to book one.

I am NOT paying $200 to renew at the embassy, especially given how crappy Sweden has been regarding this issue and I'm DEFINITELY not waking up that early and pay for an INTL call, so I will also have to open a bank account in Sweden when I go this summer. Thank God I got an appointment before this requirement for this summer.

Billy Mumphrey

Some great info here, thank you! Yes, even though we live in DC, my wife and kids have always applied for passports from the local police station in Sweden when we visit over the summer. It's always been cheap there (300 SEK?), and we can pick up the passports there in just a few days, but as you said it's a shame that the validity is limited to 5 years for adults and 3 for children. Right now we have appointments for the kids but unfortunately the new law forcing foreign-born Swedes to "reactivate" the samordningsnummer every 5 years has tripped us up.

My wife's relatives in Sweden have Swedish bank log ins, can we use one of those to make a future appointment or does it have to be the applicant's (or a parent's) bank account? If you open a Swedish bank account just for this purpose do note that it would have to be reported on your US tax return.

Even if we needed an ETIAS, I believe it's free for kids (under 18). I plan to buy one for my UK passport next year (which only costs about 100 quid including delivery, and is valid for 10 years BTW).

miamiflyer8

I don't think it has to be the applicant's log in, I think anyone can log in and book in somebody else's name and personnummer. Fee was 350kr for years, increased to 400kr in 2021 which is reasonable. Have you tried calling the DC embassy and telling them the situation and say you live in DC so you can come in at any time to "reactivate" them? Also, did you see if a Skatteverket office in Sweden is willing to do it for you prior to the passport application? If you do succeed, apply in Sweden and have them send them to DC as now it takes several weeks in Sweden to deliver compared to the previous 3-4 days. Even if you pay +$30 per shipment, it is still a fraction of the cost of one passport done at the embassy.

Please report how it ended up going!

GUWonder

Indeed the person to be issued the passport need not be able to log in themselves. A parent/guardian grandparent/others using their own log in stuff to book an appointment slot for their relatives has worked just fine this year.... if able to find a place and slot that works.

Billy Mumphrey

We contacted the embassy and they said they will only "reactivate" the number if they handle the passport renewal (at their exorbitant prices), otherwise it needs to be handled in-person in Sweden. They did confirm that the number had expired. We then contacted Skatteverket and they confirmed we could come in-person, but it then takes 4 weeks processing to "reactivate" in the population register. However, they also said the police office could do this at the same time as the passport appointment and it would just add the same 4 weeks to get the passport. So, it sounds like we can use our existing appointments and just have the passports mailed to the DC embassy (which they likely would have been anyway since it now seems to take weeks, and not days, to process in normal situations).

And we'll use the kids' US passports for Schengen immigration in order to avoid exit stamp/overstay issues (which is probably even more important if we won't have the expired passports coming home). Thanks again for all the great info.

Good to know. We have my wife's passport up for renewal next year, so we'll have to get her relatives to book her appointment time. I think they used to become available 6 months in advance so we'll just set a calendar reminder to start looking then.

MDTyKe

Just enter on Swiss, and leave on US - and if they ask, explain. Since you can stay in Schengen indefinitely, I can't see any issue.

miamiflyer8

So you’re one of those who cannot tell the difference between Sweden and Switzerland nor did you read the thread properly . The Swedish border guard will not let you out on an expired passport and they’ll be unable to process an exit without a record of entry, this may have worked pre-2015 when EU border agents weren’t strict at all, I’ve myself exited on an expired passport since they only quickly glance at it. After the 2015 refugee crisis, most if not all EU countries started to scan passports to check for validity and therefore this is easier to detect an expired doc.

MDTyKe

Switzerland, Sweden - same thing! For Schengen passports there is no requirement to have an entry record. For non EU/Schengen passports it is different of course; but I doubt leaving on a US and showing your Swedish (if it raises flags) is any issue. That said, you can simply show your Swedish passport and then show your US, or vv. As a Swedish citizen, they cannot stop you leaving, other than giving you a stink eye; especially to a nation that you hold nationality to also.

miamiflyer8

They can and have before with obscure fine print and what I predict will happen if OP does this is the border guards sitting there scratching their heads and start reading some manual on what to do. Back in the day, a Swedish citizen was not allowed to use the national ID card to fly non-Schengen directly from Sweden, take ARN-LHR for example. ARN-CPH-LHR was totally fine however, and so was a German citizen flying ARN-LHR. They have since caught their senses on this but is still worth to be aware of.

GUWonder

Swedish passport control can and do allow EU dual-citizen US passport users to exit Schengen on US passports with no Schengen entry history noted on on/via the passport presented. They generally don’t like it but it can be done. But with Swedish dual-citizens, it can be more tricky at Swedish airports of entry/exit for crossing in and out of Schengen at them. But even then the devil can be in the details.

Billy Mumphrey

Our flights home are GOT-AMS-IAD, so we will be dealing with immigration agents in the Netherlands (not Sweden). That said, I have a UK passport so it's not like using Swedish passports for the kids will save our family any time (we use the non-EU lane regardless). We just got new US passports for both kids so it will be easier to let them collect a stamp on the way in and not deal with any hassle on the way out (since we now know we'll be leaving their expired Swedish passports with the police during our trip).

That said, even if they attempted to enter on Swedish and exit on US, I have a hard time believing they wouldn't let us leave because they couldn't find a stamp. I just prefer to avoid the confrontation (I remember a very angry agent at ZRH reprimanding me about 10 years ago when I entered Schengen on a UK passport and accidentally tried to exit on a US passport, but since I had both valid passports in my possession the issue didn't escalate beyond him yelling at me).

miamiflyer8

Billy Mumphrey How did it end up going?

For me, I landed about 30 minutes late, my plans of walking from Arlanda Express to the police station on Kungsholmen weren't gonna work. My appointment was 11:40 and I got to the station at 11:33. I jumped into the first taxi I saw and hoped it's not a scammer with a crazy meter. Meter was genuine but go figure the credit card machine was "broken" of course. Now I was really running out of time. Driver asked if I had cash, I told him no SEK. He used the currency converter on his meter (didn't even know this was a thing) and he asked for EUR. I told him all I have is USD. He asked for $20 (fare was about 180:- SEK). Sold. I'd normally pick a fight if it weren't for the time.

I got into the police station and punched in my appointment number on the kiosk and the queue number slip printed at 11:38. Go figure I sat for 30 minutes waiting and once called to the counter it literally was a 3 minute process even for me who lives abroad which always requires additional documents and forms. I was quoted a waiting time of 10 weeks, so the passport will be manufactured by October, and it will be a few weeks until I can pick it up in Atlanta.