BVA · Application Process

The BVA Application Process

This page is informational, not legal advice. Procedures described here reflect publicly available BVA guidance as of the verification date shown below, and may change. Always verify current requirements on the official BVA website before submitting documents.

Last verified: September 8, 2026 · Maintained by The Next Passport (Warner Creates LLC).

The Bundesverwaltungsamt (BVA, Federal Office of Administration) in Cologne handles all four descent routes — §4 StAG Feststellung, §5 StAG declaration, Art. 116(2) Basic Law restitution and §15 StAG restitution — for one defined group of people: those living abroad. BVA states that competence without citing a statute for it, and so do we: §31 StAG is a data-protection provision («Staatsangehörigkeitsbehörden und Auslandsvertretungen dürfen personenbezogene Daten verarbeiten»), and the phrase “als Staatsangehörigkeitsbehörde für Personen im Ausland” comes from inside each Merkblatt’s GDPR notice, not from a jurisdiction rule. The Art. 116(2) Merkblatt cites §33 there, not §31.

You have three ways in, and the consulate is only one of them. BVA states on each procedure's own instructions page that you may lodge the application with your nearest German mission or send it directly to BVA; every route also now has an online service on the federal Bundesportal, which additionally handles later document submissions, withdrawals and appeals. A mission does not adjudicate your eligibility — it takes the package in, checks it is complete and forwards it. BVA does not require you to appear anywhere; each mission sets its own arrangements for handing a package over, so check the one that serves you.

The four form sets — and the one that gets mixed up

Each route has its own application form and its own ancestor annex, and the annexes have three different names. Get the pairing right before you download anything: BVA gives its two restitution routes almost the same name, and their forms are not interchangeable.

Antrag F — §4 StAG Feststellung

Antrag auf Feststellung der deutschen Staatsangehörigkeit — the primary form for regular descent cases, with Antrag F_K for applicants under 16 (BVA's download center writes that one without the underscore, as “Antrag FK”). Where you derive citizenship from German ancestors, each generation needs its own Anlage V, documenting that person's birth, naturalization status, marriages and citizenship history. The full set is Antrag F (16+) or Antrag F_K (under 16), plus the Anlage V. BVA states the Anlage V count two different ways and we name both rather than pick: its Feststellung web page says «für jede Generation einzeln», while Merkblatt F §5 says «für jede dieser maßgeblichen Personen einzeln» and expressly contemplates «Großvater und/oder Großmutter». Filing one per relevant ancestor satisfies both readings; filing one per generation may under-count where a claimant has German ancestry on both parental lines — so a typical grandparent-level claim is Antrag F plus an Anlage V for the parent and one for the grandparent.

Where the chain stops matters more than how deep it goes. Merkblatt F §5 does not say “go back three generations”; it names a stopping point. You keep filling in an Anlage V for each generation up to the ancestor who either held a Staatsangehörigkeitsausweis or Heimatschein issued by a German authority, or was born in Germany before 1914 or emigrated as a German before then, or acquired German citizenship other than by descent or adoption — by naturalization, for instance. Whichever of those you hit first ends the chain, so a claim can need fewer annexes than its generation count suggests, or more.

Filing as a family? Do not duplicate the annexes. Merkblatt F §5: where several family members (parents and children, or siblings) apply for the Feststellung at the same time, “so ist es ausreichend, die Angaben zu den gleichen Vorfahren (Anlage V) nur einem Antrag beizufügen” — the shared ancestor annexes go with one application and count for all of them. Each person still files their own Antrag F, and each still owes their own fee.

Vordruck_EER — §5 StAG declaration

Erklärung zum Erwerb der deutschen Staatsangehörigkeit nach §5 StAG. Widely called “Form EER”; BVA's own name is Vordruck_EER, and it comes with Anlage_EER plus Anlage_AV for further ancestors. Lower evidentiary burden than Antrag F, because §5 does not require proving an unbroken chain.

Antrag A — Art. 116(2) Basic Law

BVA calls this route Wiedergutmachungseinbürgerung nach Entzug — restitution after citizenship was taken away. Use Antrag A (age 16+) or Antrag AK (under 16), plus one Anlage VA per generation above your grandparents. It is the one BVA procedure whose application forms are also published in English, and BVA says why: “Ausnahmsweise stehen aufgrund des Wiedergutmachungsgedankens des Artikel 116 Abs. 2 Grundgesetz die Antragsvordrucke in englischer Sprache zur Verfügung.” The concession is to the form, not the file — the same page adds that BVA can only process applications completed in German.

Antrag E15 — §15 StAG

Wiedergutmachungseinbürgerung nach Verfolgung — restitution where persecution caused the citizenship to be lost some other way, or never acquired: most often a family that fled and then naturalized abroad. Use Antrag E15 (age 16+) or Antrag E15_K (under 16), plus one Anlage_AV per generation above your parents. This route has only existed since August 20, 2021.

E15 is not the Art. 116(2) form. It is a real BVA form — for §15 StAG. This page said otherwise until 6 September 2026, and several other sites still do. If your ancestor was denaturalized, you want Antrag A; if they fled and lost German citizenship by naturalizing abroad or by marriage, you want Antrag E15. Our Art. 116(2) page sets the two side by side.

Step-by-step process

1
Determine your path (§4, §5, or Art. 116(2))
Filing on the wrong track can result in rejection even when you are clearly eligible under another. Our free eligibility check walks you through all three paths.
2
Request Standesamt records for your German ancestors
Long-form birth, marriage, and death certificates (Geburtsurkunde, Eheurkunde, Sterbeurkunde) must come from the relevant Standesamt (German civil registry office). Budget €12–€19.50 first certified copy, €6–€9 each additional (set per Land) — the tariff is a Land matter, so it is not the same everywhere. Each Standesamt publishes its own request channel and its own form requirements — check the office's page before writing. If the relevant Standesamt was in what is now Poland, the Czech Republic, or France, German successor Standesämter may hold records, or you may need to request from the current-state registry.
3
Gather US vital records and naturalization records
Long-form birth certificates for each US-born ancestor in your chain, marriage and divorce records where relevant, and naturalization records for any ancestor who became a US citizen. NARA and USCIS are the usual sources for naturalization documentation; both have online indexes.
4
Arrange sworn German translations (confirm first for US documents)
Every non-German document must be translated by a vereidigter or ermächtigter Übersetzer — a sworn translator formally recognized by a German court. This is a specific legal standard, not the same as a generic “certified translation.”
The rule is absolute, not a matter of degree: BVA states that translations by anyone other than a sworn (vereidigt) translator are not accepted. A US-based “certified translator” who is not sworn before a German court is outside it. We publish no figure for how often this actually bites, because nobody counts it — but the rule is published, so confirm your translator's credentials before paying for a full translation package.
The rule, and what applicants report
The official rule. Every BVA Merkblatt says the same thing, in the same words: as a rule, foreign public documents must be legalised or carry a Hague apostille, and every foreign-language document needs a translation by a sworn translator. The apostille exemptions cover EU and Swiss civil-status records and multilingual certificates from six named countries. The United States is not on that list, and English is a foreign language for this purpose, so on the face of the guidance a US birth certificate needs both an apostille and a sworn translation.
What applicants report. Practitioners and community guides widely report that English-language US vital records are accepted in practice without translation, and sometimes without apostille. That is an observation about how files are handled, not a published concession — no BVA page states it, and nothing obliges an officer to keep doing it on your file.
What to do with the gap. The stake is real: sworn translations run $30–$85 per document, and on our own calculator they are the largest line on the estimate — $150–$425 across a three-generation claim, $210–$595 across four. Ask the mission handling your submission, in writing, what it expects for US-issued records — and treat the written answer, not the community consensus, as your basis for skipping anything.
5
Complete the form and its matching annex
Antrag F (16+) or Antrag F_K (under 16), plus the Anlage V. BVA states the Anlage V count two different ways and we name both rather than pick: its Feststellung web page says «für jede Generation einzeln», while Merkblatt F §5 says «für jede dieser maßgeblichen Personen einzeln» and expressly contemplates «Großvater und/oder Großmutter». Filing one per relevant ancestor satisfies both readings; filing one per generation may under-count where a claimant has German ancestry on both parental lines for §4; Vordruck_EER with Anlage_EER and Anlage_AV for §5; Antrag A (age 16+) or Antrag AK (under 16), plus one Anlage VA per generation above your grandparents for Art. 116(2); Antrag E15 (age 16+) or Antrag E15_K (under 16), plus one Anlage_AV per generation above your parents for §15. Forms are on the BVA website and available from your nearest German mission. Complete every field in German, sign and date — BVA asks that all further correspondence be in German too.
6
Submit — consulate, direct to Cologne, or online
Missions publish their own arrangements for receiving a package, and BVA requires no appearance of its own — check the page of the mission that serves you rather than assuming. A mission that takes your package forwards it to BVA Cologne, which adds transit time that nobody quantifies — the German Embassy in Vienna says only that longer postal transit times (“längere Postlaufzeiten”) must be expected. You do not need the consulate's permission to skip this step: Merkblatt F states “Sie können Ihren Antrag direkt beim Bundesverwaltungsamt stellen” — you can file directly with the BVA — and presents the mission route as the alternative, not the default. Every route also has an online service on the federal Bundesportal.
Which address depends on your carrier, not your country
Ordinary post — including from abroad — goes to Bundesverwaltungsamt, 50728 Köln, BVA's «allgemeine Postadresse», printed on its own Vollmacht form followed by “Germany”. Reach for Bundesverwaltungsamt, Barbarastr. 1, 50735 Köln, Germany only when a private courier (FedEx, UPS) or hand delivery needs a street line. Either way, declare no value on the parcel — if customs charges fall due on delivery BVA refuses the package outright and it goes back to the sender. BVA also advises against email “aus Gründen des Datenschutzes und ihrer eigenen Datensicherheit” — its reason is data protection, and separately it needs originals or certified copies.
7
Wait for the BVA Eingangsbestätigung
BVA sends an Eingangsbestätigung that carries your Aktenzeichen (file reference), and asks you to quote that reference in all later correspondence — BVA says so on the instructions page for each procedure. It publishes no timeframe for the letter, so we do not state one. Save it: the Aktenzeichen is what you quote if you move house mid-procedure, and BVA asks to be told a new address under that reference.
Moving to Germany mid-procedure moves your file. BVA's instruction about a change of address has a second sentence that most guides drop: “Sollten Sie Ihren Wohnsitz nach Deutschland verlegen, ist das Bundesverwaltungsamt für Ihr Verfahren nicht mehr zuständig. Die Antragsunterlagen werden dann von hier an die für Sie im Bundesgebiet zuständige Staatsangehörigkeitsbehörde abgegeben.” Take up residence in Germany and BVA loses competence; your papers are handed to the citizenship authority for your new address. Nobody publishes what that handover costs you in time, so we put no number on it.
8
Respond to any Nachforderung (additional-document request)
If BVA needs additional documents, they will send a Nachforderung. This is triggered by review of your file rather than by a clock: on its own page answering “Wie lange dauert die Bearbeitung eines Feststellungsantrages?”, BVA says “nicht selten müssen nach Sichtung der Antragsunterlagen noch Unterlagen nachgefordert werden” — not infrequently, further documents must be requested once the papers have been looked through — and that it sometimes has to make enquiries of German domestic authorities (“inländischen Behörden”) whose own timescales it cannot influence. Respond promptly; BVA works in order of receipt and does not chase you, so an unanswered request leaves the file sitting. BVA publishes no breakdown of what it asks for; a request can cover earlier-generation Standesamt records, more detailed naturalization documentation, or clarifying translations.
9
Pay the €51 per-person fee (§4 only) with the decision
For §4 StAG cases the fee is charged with the decision, not on approval — a refusal costs €25–€51 depending on how much work the file took, and withdrawing after processing has started costs €38. §5 StAG, Art. 116(2) and §15 are free. Payment is bank transfer only — BVA does not accept cheques, cash, credit cards or internet payment services, and a transfer from outside Germany carries its own bank charges. BVA normally sends the Staatsangehörigkeitsausweis together with the fee demand to your German mission, which explains the payment mechanics and hands over the certificate; nothing is released until the money has arrived.
10
Receive your Staatsangehörigkeitsausweis and apply for a passport
The Staatsangehörigkeitsausweis is BVA's official certificate of German citizenship. With that document in hand, you can apply for a German passport at your nearest consulate. The passport is a separate application and fee.

Fee schedule

§4 StAG Feststellung

€51 per person, raised with the decision on the application rather than paid upfront. The amount is §38(2) Nr. 2 StAG; the unit is §38(1), which charges a fee for each “individuell zurechenbare öffentliche Leistung” — an individually attributable public service. So it is per applicant, not per application: each family member files their own Antrag F, and a family of four owes €204.

A refusal is not free. Merkblatt F §8 sets it at €25–€51, expressly “in Abhängigkeit vom entstandenen Verwaltungsaufwand” — scaled to the administrative effort the file generated — and a withdrawal after processing has begun costs €38. Both amounts come from §38(2) Satz 3 StAG, which is where the shape of the band comes from too: withdrawal or refusal “nach Beginn der sachlichen Bearbeitung” attracts a fee of “25 Euro bis zu dem Betrag … der als Gebühr für die Vornahme der beantragten Leistung vorgesehen ist” — €25 up to the €51 the service itself would have cost. Merkblatt F does not state a unit for these two; each applicant files their own Antrag F and receives their own decision, so we read them as per person like the €51, but that is our inference and not BVA's words. Payment is bank transfer only — BVA does not accept cheques, cash, credit cards or internet payment services, and a transfer from outside Germany carries its own bank charges.

One escape hatch nobody advertises: under §38(4) StAG the fees under §38(2) may be reduced or waived “aus Gründen der Billigkeit oder des öffentlichen Interesses” — on equity or public-interest grounds. No published criteria, no published success rate, and BVA does not mention it in Merkblatt F; it is a statutory discretion, not an application form.

§5 StAG Declaration

No BVA fee under the §38(3) Nr. 4 StAG waiver. Budget separately for the police certificate BVA requires with a §5 declaration — for a US applicant, an FBI Identity History Summary plus a federal authentication, roughly $38 per person, which neither the §4 nor the Art. 116(2) route needs.

Art. 116(2) restitution, and §15 StAG

Both free, under two different numbers of the same subsection: Art. 116(2) under §38(3) Nr. 1 StAG, which also covers the certificate issued under its Satz 2, and §15 StAG under §38(3) Nr. 2 StAG. Both Merkblätter say it in one line, though not quite the same line — the Art. 116(2) Merkblatt reads “Das Verfahren ist gebührenfrei”, the §15 Merkblatt “Das Verfahren ist für Sie gebührenfrei” — and both add, word for word, that your own costs for obtaining records, translations and certifications cannot be reimbursed “sowohl im Falle der Einbürgerung als auch bei Erlass einer ablehnenden Entscheidung”: whether the application succeeds or fails.

Standesamt records

€12–€19.50 first certified copy, €6–€9 each additional (set per Land). The spread is real, not marginal — the top of the first-copy range is over 60% above the bottom — so check the tariff of the Land you are writing to. If you cannot name the office that registered the event, a search fee applies on top, and it is charged per event rather than per order: Berlin's tariff sets €20–€80 “abhängig vom Suchaufwand” (according to the research effort), and Munich charges up to €100 per Personenstandsfall.

Sworn translations

$30–$85 per document as a market estimate — no German authority or professional body sets a private translation price, so treat this as a budget figure rather than a tariff. Most US vital records are 1–2 pages, which is why a per-document figure works; a longer file will be quoted per page or per line and can run higher. Across a whole claim that is roughly $150–$425 at three generations and $210–$595 at four, taking three and four ancestors with none deceased, married or divorced — the same figures our cost calculator returns at specific inputs, so here are the inputs: §4 Feststellung or §5 declaration, three or four generations counting yourself, no deceased ancestors, US applicant. Change the track and they change — Art. 116(2) and §15 restitution need a shorter document set, giving $120–$340 at three generations and $180–$510 at four — and each deceased ancestor adds a death certificate to translate. Run your own numbers rather than reading ours.

Timeline expectations

Budget 2–3 years from submission to issuance of the Staatsangehörigkeitsausweis. That is the German missions' own wording — the processing time “may take” two to three years — and not an average. Asked in the Bundestag for the average, the Federal Government answered that it “wird statistisch nicht erfasst”: it is not recorded, so none exists to quote. That answer is Drucksache 17/5727 of 5 May 2011 and it is the most recent one on the point we can find — old enough that you should read it as evidence the statistic was never kept, not as a description of today's queue. Art. 116(2) cases have no published processing figure either — the Foreign Office says only that times vary greatly by case and that files are worked in order of receipt. The BVA publishes no processing time for §5 StAG declarations; community Freedom of Information data running to December 2024 shows files decided then had waited about 26 months, with 26,228 declarations still pending. §5 needs a shorter evidence chain than a multi-generation §4 Feststellung, which lowers Nachforderung risk — but it does not move you up the queue.

See our detailed processing-times guide for what happens at submission, at the Eingangsbestätigung, at a Nachforderung, at month 24 and at the decision.

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Not legal advice. BVA procedures and fee schedules change. Verify current requirements on the official BVA website and consult a licensed German citizenship attorney for guidance on your specific application.