derdre

Just to give a little update on this topic: Last week Thursday I applied for the so called Exit & Entry permit that allows my boys to leave China and travel to EU/Germany using their German passport. The application was actually simple and I was able to do the entire task my own as the father, my wife (and mother, who is working in the US) was not required to be present, only her ID-card. All required documents were presented to the officer, including a filled out application form for each of my son, as well the flight booking (e-ticket) with their western/Pinyin names as stated in the German passport. Tomorrow, June 25th, I can pick up these travel documents, the processing time is only about 3-5 business days, at least here in southern Guangdong. That document is valid for one exit and entry. Last week Wednesday, I applied for ESTA using the German passport and the was approved within one hour after submission. So also this topic is resolved and let us continue our journey to the US from Germany. So, this said, everything is resolved and we're all set for our EU/US trip. When it comes to the next trip to the US, in that case most likely from China directly, I may have a chance using neighboring Hong Kong as an intermediate hop into the US. However, this is a different story and I will come back to report on this as well. Thanks to the forum and your responses which really shed some light on the topic. Y'all replies were much appreciated help!

@Operator Thanks for reaching out, it is never too late. Even though, I promised to report back to this thread whenever I have news. As for your post, this is exactly the way I'm going and what you're writing about is the so called Exit & Entry permit (出入境通行证), actually a little blue booklet, similar to a passport. For our summer travel plans (CN -> DE -> US -> CN) with my two boys and their German/EU passport this seems to be the only reasonable way to go. I also talked to another friend of mine in Sichuan, he did the same and it worked. All I need to watch out for is, that the Chinese government is not getting the silly idea to cancel the boys Hukou (household registry) cause they both would lose all the benefits a Chinese citizen enjoys (school, insurance, social, etc. ). I read that a Hukou cancellation has happened to some people in the same situation, however, this is not a national policy, it's rather a local decision. I will figure this out by next week and apply for the Exit & Entry permit. Afaik it gonna take approx. 5 days processing time. As I see, this topic is of some interest. I will promise to keep this updated until all questions/issues are resolved on our side. Only this makes it a complete solution, maybe of help to others.

Hello forum experts, I have a rather technical question and seek for some confirmation for my thoughts below. I've contacted the U.S. consulate in Guangzhou as well as Berlin, but not sure if they really gonna respond to my question. I am a German citizen living in Guangdong/China based on a family-reunion residence permit. I have 2 children, ages 8 and 10 born in China and holding the Chinese passport, as well as the German passport (due to my German citizenship as their father). We plan to travel to the US by the end of July for about 4-5 weeks to meet old friends of mine and also to show my children part of the country. A couple of days ago I submitted for my children (on behalf of their Chinese citizenship and passport) the DS-160 application with the Guangzhou U.S. consulate, received the CEAC confirmation and will pay and book an appointment in the upcoming days. However, I didn't realize the long waiting time for the interview appointment in Guangzhou, which is 113 days - most likely to happen in September. By that time we would have already returned back to China. . Our travel plan would include Germany as the first stop, from there, we would travel to the US and finally return back to China. Once we returned back to China in late August, I would continue to apply for their B1/B2 visa for their Chinese passports at the given interview appointment as initially intended. So my actual, rather technical question is, if it is possible for my children for our planned summer trip to the US to use their German passports with a prior clearance using ESTA to apply for a US entry while I've already triggered the process to apply for a B1/B2 visa for their Chinese passports? I do not want to bring up some kind of confusion after all. So, is the above way working and legit without further issues or a negative impact on their future B1/B2 visa approval? Any hints and thoughts are greatly appreciated! Thanks for spending your time on my issue 🙂