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Departure

If you are obliged to leave the country or if you are inevitably threatened with deportation in the foreseeable future, you should plan to leave for your country of origin or to move on to a third country.

You can settle your affairs within the deadline, avoid a re-entry ban and can apply for return assistance.

You should discuss a planned departure with the Foreigners' Registration Office and the Social Services Department. Comprehensive advice is available, for example, from the return advice centers of the AWO and Caritas.

In emergency situations, you can ask for support with costs incurred during the preparation for departure, e.g. fees for passports and visas.

If you move on or return to your country of origin, you can apply for assistance. In this case, you can receive funds from the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

The funds are provided under the "Reintegration and Emigration Program for Asylum Seekers in Germany" (REAG) and the "Government Assisted Repatriation Program" (GARP).

These humanitarian aid programs ensure your return if neither you nor your dependants can provide the necessary funds.

REAG's support measures include transportation costs and travel assistance. GARP grants start-up aid for returnees from certain countries of origin.

Applications can be submitted

  • at the responsible German authorities (immigration authorities and social welfare office).
  • in state-run hostels.
  • at counseling centers of the independent welfare associations.
  • at specialist advice centers.
  • at central return counseling centers.
  • with foreigners' representatives.
  • via the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

Some returnees are completely or partially excluded from the support programs.

  • Citizens of EU member states do not receive any benefits.
  • Dublin cases do not receive any benefits.
  • Nationals of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the former Yugoslav Republic, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro and Serbia receive benefits towards travel costs at best.

Exceptions are victims of prostitution and human trafficking.

From February 2017, there will also be the additional support program StarthilfePlus. Under certain conditions, returnees who are excluded from other programs can be supported by StarthilfePlus.

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A deportation is a forced departure. The immigration authority will carry out a deportation if your departure is legally and actually possible and only fails because you do not want to leave.

Deportation is not announced and can take place at any time if you have not left voluntarily within the set period. It can be accompanied by the police or other security forces and, in extreme cases, enforced under duress. Deportations can affect individuals as well as entire groups. If a court sees no other way of enforcing your departure, it can order you to be held in custody pending deportation for up to 6 months.

If you are actually deported, you may face long entry bans.

As long as you have appealed against a simple rejection or filed an urgent application in the event of a rejection as "manifestly unfounded", the obligation to leave the country will not be enforced.

An expulsion means the withdrawal of your residence permit, which means that you may be required to leave the country. There is a special interest in deportation in the case of serious criminal offenses and threats to public safety and order as well as other interests of the Federal Republic of Germany.

If the reasons for your deportation are deemed to outweigh the interest in remaining in Germany, you will be required to leave the country. You will then be subject to an entry ban.

After deportation or expulsion, you will be banned from staying in Germany in general and from re-entering the Schengen area. The duration of the re-entry ban can be up to 5 years. In particularly serious, criminally relevant cases, the entry ban can be extended to 10 years.

If you violate this order, you can be punished with a heavy fine or a prison sentence of up to 3 years.

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To avoid being deported, some people who are obliged to leave the country hide from the authorities and try to live illegally.

It is difficult to survive in this way and you have no option for an ultimately legal stay. In contrast to other European countries, there has never been an amnesty regulation for illegalized persons in Germany.

Some refugees seek protection from imminent deportation in religious communities. This can be useful if there is concrete hope of a right of residence and time needs to be gained for this.

The congregations only grant temporary protection from deportation in cases of particular hardship, which would involve unreasonable risks for those affected.

Beratungsangebote

Es ist unschätzbar wertvoll, Hilfe zu bekommen, wenn man nicht mehr weiter weiß. Deshalb gibt es in Deutschland viele Beratungsstellen, die Hilfesuchenden in den unterschiedlichsten Lebenssituationen mit Fachwissen zur Seite stehen.