Can I get married online through the state of Utah to my Dutch fiancé and then have him visit me in the US?

[rhacodactylus 1]

Hi there!! I see some people talking about WebWed, I have no clue what that is. What I want to do is file for a marriage certificate with Utah County and have a marriage ceremony over Zoom. My question is will my partner be able to visit me in the US? I don’t have enough money or time away for work to fly to the netherlands to get married. 
 

Will this cause problems down the line of me wanting to move to the netherlands. I hear online weddings can be a pain in making the visa process harder. But I think technically (I’m not sure) if we get married “in” the US (online) our marriage isn’t recognized in the Netherlands unless we go and declare it. I’m not sure how that all works, but if it doesn’t stop me from being able to move to Europe I’m down to do anything to get my fiancé here to the US. We were planning to marry in December (we have the tickets and everything) but then the travel ban happened and nothing has changed since. 
 

edit: I’m planning to apply for school over in NL and then when I’m 21 applying to register as my fiancé’s/and or husbands partner to get my residence permit and then after 5 years apply for citizenship. I’m not sure how it works with marriages abroad and such. 
 

 

Edited September 21, 2020 by rhacodactylus

[Boiler 45,852]

Is this somebody you have met.

 

They can come to the US, just need to quarantine first in somewhere like Mexico.

 

This is a US immigration site maybe somebody who knows the Dutch system but a long shot.

 

 

[laylalex 7,293]

In order for a proxy marriage to be acceptable for immigration purposes, it has to be consummated. You can't do that without you and your husband meeting in person -- and if that's the case, why not meet in person and get married in person? If you have tickets for December, get married then if you can enter the Netherlands and get married there. If you can't go there, and he can't come here, or you can't get to the same third country, you are SOL when it comes to consummating the marriage, or marrying in person.

 

Take a step back here. You are under 21, obviously. How much under 21? Is it even legal for you to marry in any of the places you might marry? And if your end is to live in the Netherlands (which it sort of looks like with your educational plans, and what looks like intent to get a Dutch residency permit and citizenship?), why are you even bothering with US immigration? You do know how long all of this takes, right? A spousal visa takes over a year at the best of times, throw in the pandemic and...? Then you need to remove conditions (another 2 years after your husband enters on his visa) plus another year to be eligible for citizenship, then all the time waiting for that to process. If you move over to NL before he becomes a citizen and intend to stay there and make your home there, he may be deemed to have abandoned his residency. Citizenship is the only way to avoid this.

 

So in an ideal world, you're talking about at least 4 years from filing to citizenship for your husband. These are COVID19 times so add in all the unpredictability of that. If you want to live in the Netherlands and go to school there, I wonder why you'd throw away all the money and time on the US process. 

[rhacodactylus 1]

5 minutes ago, Boiler said:

Is this somebody you have met.

 

They can come to the US, just need to quarantine first in somewhere like Mexico.

 

This is a US immigration site maybe somebody who knows the Dutch system but a long shot.

 

 

I have met him 3 times already for about 2 months. I’m just curious if we did it online that he would be accepted in as my spouse because we don’t have enough money for him to quarantine in mexico 

[laylalex 7,293]

1 minute ago, rhacodactylus said:

I have met him 3 times already for about 2 months. I’m just curious if we did it online that he would be accepted in as my spouse because we don’t have enough money for him to quarantine in mexico 

No. You need to consummate the marriage in order for it to be accepted by USCIS. You cannot do that unless you are able to consummate it, which requires that you two be in the same place at the same time. If you can't meet right now, you need to wait. I know the waiting sucks! Trust me, I went through a K1 process a long time ago and I thought I'd die waiting. But you are very young, and you two have all the time in the world to be together. Be patient and do it right, or you will end up losing time and money.

[rhacodactylus 1]

12 minutes ago, laylalex said:

In order for a proxy marriage to be acceptable for immigration purposes, it has to be consummated. You can't do that without you and your husband meeting in person -- and if that's the case, why not meet in person and get married in person? If you have tickets for December, get married then if you can enter the Netherlands and get married there. If you can't go there, and he can't come here, or you can't get to the same third country, you are SOL when it comes to consummating the marriage, or marrying in person.

 

Take a step back here. You are under 21, obviously. How much under 21? Is it even legal for you to marry in any of the places you might marry? And if your end is to live in the Netherlands (which it sort of looks like with your educational plans, and what looks like intent to get a Dutch residency permit and citizenship?), why are you even bothering with US immigration? You do know how long all of this takes, right? A spousal visa takes over a year at the best of times, throw in the pandemic and...? Then you need to remove conditions (another 2 years after your husband enters on his visa) plus another year to be eligible for citizenship, then all the time waiting for that to process. If you move over to NL before he becomes a citizen and intend to stay there and make your home there, he may be deemed to have abandoned his residency. Citizenship is the only way to avoid this.

 

So in an ideal world, you're talking about at least 4 years from filing to citizenship for your husband. These are COVID19 times so add in all the unpredictability of that. If you want to live in the Netherlands and go to school there, I wonder why you'd throw away all the money and time on the US process. 

I have no intention of bringing my fiancé to become an American citizen. We are not planning on getting him a spousal visa. The whole reason for the online thing is because we have bought tickets (almost a year ago) for him to come here in December for 3 weeks. I can’t move to the netherlands until next summer. Otherwise I would move there now. 
 

I will have to look into going over to Europe to get married before December. We have briefly looked into this but it’s expensive to have an unplanned visit and get time off of my work. And last I checked it’s legal to get married as long as you are over 18 in the US and netherlands so I don’t know why you’re asking my age. 

Edited September 22, 2020 by rhacodactylus

[laylalex 7,293]

2 minutes ago, rhacodactylus said:

I have no intention of bringing my fiancé to become an American citizen. We are not planning on getting him a spousal visa. The whole reason for the online thing is because we have bought tickets (almost a year ago) for him to come here in December for 3 weeks. I can’t move to the netherlands until next summer. Otherwise I would move there now. 
 

I will have to look into going over to Europe to get married before December. We have briefly looked into this but it’s expensive to have an unplanned visit and get time off of my work. And last I checked it’s legal to get married as long as you are over 18 in the US and netherlands so I don’t know why you’re asking my age. 

I asked your age because you said you had to wait until you were 21 to wait to do something -- there's a decent chance that you might be under 18 if you have to wait to be 21.  That's all -- just a box to tick.

 

No matter what, a proxy marriage is still not going to work to get around the restrictions for him to come here right now (you obviously know the loophole -- my sister-in-law-to-be was also thinking about it because she lives in Scotland and her boyfriend is out here in California, and they haven't seen each other in ages, but she has no intention of ever living here). You still need to consummate the marriage.  

 

Please don't take any of this the wrong way -- I can get very mother hen about young people getting married (I was pretty young myself when I got engaged to my first husband, early 20s). I know it seems like forever and a day from now, but you are going to have to wait if you can't see him and he can't see you for a while because of money/time off work. 

[rhacodactylus 1]

35 minutes ago, laylalex said:

I asked your age because you said you had to wait until you were 21 to wait to do something -- there's a decent chance that you might be under 18 if you have to wait to be 21.  That's all -- just a box to tick.

 

No matter what, a proxy marriage is still not going to work to get around the restrictions for him to come here right now (you obviously know the loophole -- my sister-in-law-to-be was also thinking about it because she lives in Scotland and her boyfriend is out here in California, and they haven't seen each other in ages, but she has no intention of ever living here). You still need to consummate the marriage.  

 

Please don't take any of this the wrong way -- I can get very mother hen about young people getting married (I was pretty young myself when I got engaged to my first husband, early 20s). I know it seems like forever and a day from now, but you are going to have to wait if you can't see him and he can't see you for a while because of money/time off work. 

Sorry, your comments just came off as very aggressive! I’m going to contact the municipality in the netherlands and see if we both need to be there to notify them of us wanting to get married (it says to notify them two weeks in advance) I hope not because then I can have my fiancé notify them and I can fly out a few days before the ceremony and fly back to the states afterwards. That way I don’t need 2-3 weeks off of work, only 1 or so. 
 

I think that would be the cheapest option. Third country is just too much. I’m scared though that if we do this the travel ban might be lifted and all of it will have been a waste of money and time. 

Edited September 22, 2020 by rhacodactylus

[jeanieCZ 228]

2 hours ago, rhacodactylus said:

 

edit: I’m planning to apply for school over in NL and then when I’m 21 applying to register as my fiancé’s/and or husbands partner to get my residence permit and then after 5 years apply for citizenship. I’m not sure how it works with marriages abroad and such. 
 

 

 

Typically, to get married in NL, you will need to inform the municipality ahead and MEET IN PERSON with your marriage officiant prior to your wedding.

Is your fiance a Dutch citizen? Have him call the gemeente and ask about the conditions. Also, have him ask about the documents that you, a US citizen (I assume) will need to get married there. Or maybe the municipality has that info on their website - the Dutch usually have all the info you need somewhere online, mostly even available in English. Think birth certificate, marital status certificate proving you are not married ATM, evidence of permanent residence etc. 

 

This is quite a helpful source to find out what a foreign spouse of a Dutch/EU citizen needs to do to register for residency in the Netherlands: https://ind.nl/en/family/Pages/Spouse-or-partner.aspx

Edited September 22, 2020 by jeanieCZ
extra info

[SteveInBostonI130 3,477]

Hi,

 

Please note that there is a travel ban that bars Americans tourists to the Netherlands.  I am not sure it will be lifted by December.

 

[retheem 568]

I have a kweshon. So if one does an online marriage and then you have to send evidence that you have consummated, what evidence is supposed to be sent as proof that you consummated the marriage? Technically speaking, meeting after marriage is not proof that one consummated the marriage? Is someone supposed to send pictures of the consummation act or what?   #AskingForMyselfand69others

[payxibka 10,047]

55 minutes ago, retheem said:

I have a kweshon. So if one does an online marriage and then you have to send evidence that you have consummated, what evidence is supposed to be sent as proof that you consummated the marriage? Technically speaking, meeting after marriage is not proof that one consummated the marriage? Is someone supposed to send pictures of the consummation act or what?   #AskingForMyselfand69others

They want proof of face to face meeting.  That's it.  There is a presumption of consummation as a result 

Edited September 23, 2020 by payxibka

[Boiler 45,852]

3 hours ago, payxibka said:

They want proof of face to face meeting.  That's it.  There is a presumption of consummation as a result 

Not everyone gets lucky.

[Fr8dog 312]

Do some serious research before going this route. The IND (Dutch USCIS) is not known for it's laid back approach.

Generally speaking, US marriage certificates are accepted in the Netherlands (as long as you get a legal US version, you should be good).

 

You may also point your partner to:

https://justis.nl/producten/huwelijk/trouwen-bij-volmacht/index.aspx

There is an option for getting married in Holland without being present aka proxy wedding or "trouwen met de handschoen"

 

The option "registered partner" may fit you better. Again have your partner check with local authorities

 

Good place to start:

https://ind.nl/Familie/partner

 

[Fr8dog 312]

Edit:

Checking the municipalities website will most likely work better than calling. Do not expect to get correct info from the switchboard operator or even person answering the phone if you get transferred to the correct department. Most if the first and second line employees are temps.

 

Work backwards. Start at the end result and see what you need to do to get there.

For instance, it is very likely that you do not need a visa to get into the Netherlands and can apply for a residence permit while in the Netherlands without getting married or registered partnership

The IND site will guide you through the process by answering questions and giving you list of required documents.