FAQ – FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

No, Polish citizenship confirmation is not a Polish passport. It is the document that confirms that its holder is a Polish citizen. Polish citizenship confirmation enables one to apply for the Polish passport, though.

It is pretty simple and can be done in 4 steps:

1. Get yourself a Polish citizenship confirmation and Polish vital records,
2. Book a visit in the nearest Polish consulate,
3. Take a nice passport photo,
4. Go to the consulate and submit your passport application.

It is not possible to get a Polish passport from the Consulate by a proxy, by the way. You need to apply for it personally, since your fingerprints have to be taken.

You can get it if you are eligible for Polish citizenship and have documents proving that your ancestors were Polish citizens. The process is conducted at the Voivodeship Office and basically you can do it yourself. However, taking into account that the whole process is in Polish and not everybody likes bureaucracy, it is good to have a proxy that knows what (s)he is doing (e.g. Patrycja or Gosia 😉 )

Birth certificate is not sufficient to prove Polish citizenship, as citizenship is determined by the “right of blood” (ius sanguinis) in Poland and not the “right of soil“ (as it is common, for example, in USA and South American countries). It means that one can be born in Poland, but it doesn’t make him Polish citizen.

No, to complete the process hard copies of original documents are necessary. We will not send your old family documents to the offices, but will need them to make notary copies of your documents.

It is understandable that you may not be keen on sending old documents that far. In such situation there are three ways of dealing with it:

1. You can make notary copies – if you are living e.g. in Argentine or Brazil (it is not true for countries like USA or UK);
2. You can make certified copies of the documents in the nearest Polish consulate;
3. We can search for the alternative documents in the Polish archives.

The list of documents is prepared individually for each client (as each case is different), but there are a few that are common. There are: vital records of applicant, documents proving kinship between applicant and his Polish ancestors (birth and marriage certificates), in some cases naturalization certificates and documents proving that your Polish ancestor did not serve in the foreign army. Since we have dealt with hundreds of cases until now, we usually know which documents are obligatory, which are not, and where to go in order to get them. If you are not sure where to start, just ask us.

If it were up to us, the process would be completed within 1 month (it is approximately how much time we need to deal with the formalities). Since it is not only up to us, the whole process may take about 9 months.

It is an identification number used in Poland, necessary if you want to apply for the Polish passport. It is issued on the basis of Polish vital records. Application for the PESEL number will be filled out at the Polish consulate during the passport visit.

No, it is not necessary to speak Polish nor to pass language tests in order to get Polish citizenship confirmation. But, if you try to do it, you will definitely have some fun.

No, visiting Poland is not required – the whole process can be completed remotely.

Yes, having a Polish passport means that you can live in any country that is a member of the European Union and enjoy all the rights and benefits of being an European citizen. Sounds great, isn’t it?