Hi all,
I am about to relocate to the Netherlands for work as a Highly Skilled Migrant but I'm facing a big headache with my birth certificate.
I was born in China but have been a NZ citizen since I was 14 (I'm 30 now), so I have a NZ passport.
The company in charge in immigration is telling me that I must have my birth certificate legalized by the Chinese Foreign Affairs (in China), and then have it apostilled by the Dutch Embassy in China. This is a major headache for me. I have not been back to China for almost 20 years and legally I have really nothing to do with China.
I can have my birth certificate notarized in NZ and legalized by the Chinese Embassy in NZ, but I'm not sure if this will be acceptable. Then there is still the step of having it apostilled.
Does anyone have any ideas? Surely it cannot be this difficult! I'm certain I'm not the only person of Asian decent with a NZ (or AUS, US) passport working in the EU. Did everybody from my background have to go through the same headache?
Would appreciate some advice as it's stressing me out right now!
Many thanks
Headache with Birth Certificate
Hi again,
I kind of agree with you in that you can't be the first person to have issues with a birth certificate when it comes to immigrating anywhere in the world.
The people who will have the answer (be it good or bad), are the legal company handling your case. They will know (or if they don't, perhaps your company should be asking elsewhere) if there has been any former precedence in how this matter has been dealt with in the past.
Leading on from the former, you also have to understand that if the Dutch Government really won't accept you without the document they are asking for, then you have 2 options, go back to China and sort it out, or accept you aren't going to be working in Holland (and probably many other countries because Holland is not unique in requiring official legalised documentation).
Hope this helps.
Cynic
Expat Team
I've been working on this for the past couple of months and even produced a NZ Apostille of my birth certificate, which the Dutch government still won't accept.
Then we researched on how to get this done in China. The process is lengthy but doable. Unfortunately we came across a hurdle that it does look like we are able to overcome.
The first step is to get a certification from the Public Security Bureau, who will still have records of our "Hukou" which were deregistered when we became NZ citizens.
The trouble is my dad's Hokou is with another Bureau, and of course deregistered. This means the Public Security Bureau can't put my dad's name on the certificate with details of my birth, and hence it cannot be notarised.
This basically means I won't be able to give the Dutch government what they are asking for.
The company helping me with my relocation tells me not to worry, and they are saying you can get your BSN without the certificate and they will give you three months to produce it. Even after three months, nothing will happen if you keep them updated.
But to me this is extremely stressful. I don't know if I will asked to leave the country if I ultimately fail to produce a certificate that's acceptable?
This I guess is my first taste of the famous Dutch Bureaucracy. I looked at a couple of other countries in Europe and the US and not many of them require a Legalised birth certificate just for a work/residence permit.
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