Help

Hello everyone,

I think I have a bit of a problem.  I am American but I have been living in the UK for 5 years and my kids were born here.  They have British passports but should (or did) have claimed to US passports.  I rushed back to Pennsylvania last year to visit an ailing relative and brought the kids along on British passports because  I had to get there fast.  I did not realize at that time that its a big no no to travel to the US on a foreign passport if you have claim to citizenship but apparently that is the case. 

Now I want to do what I should have done right away (but I'm a moron) and get an appointment at the embassy to report their births and apply for US passports.  Is this going to be a problem?  Has anyone dealt with this situation?  I'm stressing a bit and kicking myself.   

My understainding is that this has only become a big "no-no" relatively recently and I'm sure you're not the first person (and won't be the last) to be in this position.  I'm sure that the US Embassy will be (at least realtively) sympathetic ... but I wouldn't pretend to be an expert or know how much paperwork would be involved.   In other words, I don't think you need to stress!

Look in the Pregnancy & Parenting section - there's a whole thread on this subject.

Thank you so much for replying.  I should have checked out the parenting section before I posted. Anyways I finally got through to the embassy and Im getting it sorted out.  They don't care that I flew with them on Brit passports in the past but I'm not to do it again.  Apparantly the airlines can get a $5000 fine if they allow passengers with claim to US passports get on the plane with a foreign passport (if they are traveling to the US).