After much research and a waste of time with a couple of lawyers I have finally figured out how to proceed with the least trouble to change my passport gender. I have a British passport and they have been ever so helpful. They actually assigned me a person on their GRP (Gender Recognition Panel) who has given me great advice, better than the lawyers. However, its still quite a few loops they make you jump thru. There are 3 menthods to obtain a GRC (Gender Recognition Certificate) which I need before a new passport and I found that an overseas application would be the easiest. I was born and live in Hong Kong and they have recently enacted a Transgender law that fully recognises us, including marriage, but they do not allow same sex marriages. While the UK allows birth certificate change in HK they do not allow changes to the birth certificate. This allows a marriage before the gender change to be legal. If you have surgery to change your gender then all you need is medical documentation and they will issue a HK ID card. The British government will then automatically issue you a GRC under the overseas application.

So I will have my surgeries done in Thailand and when recovered then I will return to HK and get my new ID. Returning to HK does not require a passport for residents and we have a computer passport control which uses your thumbprint and has no relation to how you look. Then all there was left was how to leave Thailand witha male passport which does not resemble me. This is easily solved with a MD certificate and a pre op and post op photo..

So all my fretting is resolved....I think

Hi - this is good to know.  It's rather odd though, that the UK will happily change the gender marker of a passport on the grounds of a letter from a docter, but the GRC requires you to have lived full time for two years before they consider issuing a certificate.  Even if you have SRS before the two years, you still need to wait two years.  It's all a bit strange, and I'm seeing how I can use Spanish process to get there faster.

But good luck Warlockmaker - this is great progress.

Quote from: Julia-Madrid on June 17, 2015, 05:12:53 AM
......It's rather odd though, that the UK will happily change the gender marker of a passport on the grounds of a letter from a docter, but the GRC requires you to have lived full time for two years before they consider issuing a certificate.  Even if you have SRS before the two years, you still need to wait two years.  It's all a bit strange......

Indeed Julia, the Gender Recognition Act. has many 'hoops' for one to jump through in order to satisfy the {perhaps} rather over-prescriptive rules and circumstances of its administration.
Although, since its enactment, it has been concomitantly amended to reflect recent changes to U.K law, so 'we' may also hope for it to be revised in the future and made more welcoming.

There have also been issues for women (such as I) whom fully-transitioned and had GRS many-many decades ago and whom 'missed' notice of the initial 6 month fast-track process for women 'post-surgery' when the GRA came into force in 2004; for whom now their psychiatrists and surgeons are long-since retired (or deceased) and for whom it would be nearly impossible to provide contemporaneous evidence, not to mention the alternative, which would be the ludicrous solution, of expecting the applicant to consult a present-day "specialist working the field of gender identity" for a retrospective diagnosis (long after their GRS and perhaps 30 or 40 years living happily as female), simply in order to satisfy the precise 'evidential diagnosis' requirement of the GRC application.

I`m sure quite a few other women whose personal circumstances fall {even only slightly} outside the rigid evidential constraints the GR-Act; have to find creative solutions to progress an application for a certificate.

Quote from: CollieLass on June 17, 2015, 07:40:12 AM

I`m sure quite a few other women whose personal circumstances fall {even only slightly} outside the rigid evidential constraints the GR-Act; have to find creative solutions to progress an application for a certificate.

Hi CollieLAss, this is definitely true.  Part of my issue and some of the extra hoops relates to my real name being gender neutral, so I never changed it... and the council usually wants evidence of a name change.  Indeed, the same is true here in Spain.  Plus, they want evidence of letters from bank et al which begin "Dear Ms X" and this isn't how letters are addressed in Spain, where they will often just say "Estimado/a..." to cover both genders. 

I wonder if things like social media are potentially able to be part of the evidence, since I charted all my key steps on Facebook...

There is a shortcut for a Uk passport if you have been accepted by a recognized country on their list and apply on the Overseas track.  There is no question on the length of time of the RLE on the overseas application track, if you have a copy of the "Guidance on completing the Overseas application form for a GRC certificate". Our HK travel documents and ID cards will change your gender if you have an SRS. Thus you bypass the 2 year issue.

Thanks.  The process for me in Spain is not clear, as I'm a resident only, and the process which exists handles citizens only... to be investigated...

I hold various passports, Hong Kong and UK plus Portugese. And I dont live in the UK and not claiming any UK benefits and born in HK. HK is kinda cool about it all, while they do NOT allow the same sex marriage they get around my marriage being legal because they will NOT change the birth certificate. Once I change my IDs in HK I can marry a male - so strange but it works......