Breaking News

Entry with machine-readable passports According to reports by the New York Times, the Spiegel and the Neue Züricher Zeitung, the US have agreed to extend the deadline for machine-readable passports, which has originally been October 1, 2003, until October 26, 2004. As we have reported several times in our most recent issues, citizens of 27 mostly European countries will then only be able to travel under the Visa Waiver Program if they have a machine-readable passport. Many European countries that don't have suitable travel documents so far have asked the US to extend the deadline for this specific measure. According to the New York Times, the paper has a corresponding order from the US Secretary of State to all US consulates abroad.

Meanwhile the US State Department has denied any such statements and announced that such regulations would only become effective in case the affected countries would file a written petition with the US government in which they would also commit themselves to introduce machine-readable passports for all citizens (so-called MRPs) and pursue passport forgery more strictly.

Since we have no knowledge of any such petition to the US government by the German government, we assume that starting October 1, you will need a machine-readable passport to enter the US, for all family members irrespective of their age.

PS: The common German passport IS machine-readable, only the preliminary green passports and child IDs or the listing of children in the parents' passports will no longer be accepted!

For more information, do not hesitate to contact our visa and emigration consulting department. Best use the contact form on our website.

California: New regulations for driver's licenses The US state of California has passed a new law according to which persons without a Social Security Card may also take the driver's license test. The Individual Taxpayers Identification Number (ITIN) is sufficient from now on. This invalidates the law of 1995, which required a Social Security Card. The new law may be especially of interest to some non-immigrants who are in the US on a study visa or a temporary work visa and often can no longer obtain a Social Security Card as a consequence of September 11, 2001 (see also today's How To section for further information). The law, which has been signed by the Governor of California on September 5, 2003, will officially take effect on January 1, 2004.