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Spouse Visa Rage (I just need to rant)
BrunoM
Posts: 1,722 Forumite
So my wife and I have been happily married for a couple of years. She is Californian, and moved to London to live with me.
When we first got married, we had to request permission as she was on a visitor visa at the time. We then had to fly to the US, request a spouse visa for her from the US, before returning to the UK. This was an annoying process, but ok.
The initial spouse visa expires after 2 years. After this time you then need to apply for indefinite right to remain, and prove that you are still married and living together, etc. Annoying process, but ok.
The above costs £750. Not ok, not ok at all, but no choice so, ok.
You have to apply within 28 days of the 2 year visa expiring, but not before. You have to submit both partner's actual passports, and they don't guarantee any time frames (usually between 4 and 10 weeks). Not ok, I sometimes need to travel for work, but no choice, so ok.
You have to submit a long chain of original documentation, including bank statements, signed statements from family-members for any periods where you lived with relatives, payslips, and a large quantity of proofs of address from approved sources like utility companies. They request 10 items which show both you and your partner's names together. As my wife is a stay-at-home mum, obviously not many bills are in a joint name, so we included those that were (council tax bills a year apart, water bills, etc) as well as a covering letter as requested explaining why not, and excessive quantities of official documentations showing both our names at the same address separately from each other. Very, very annoying process, but ok.
You have to submit on the approved form available online. I downloaded and printed this form, spent a long and careful time completing it and gathering documentation over several weeks, and then submitted at the required time. I was charged the full £750 within 3 days of doing this. 5 weeks later I had everything returned - in between printing the form and submitting it, they had issued an updated form on the website (no changes relevant to our application), so the application was invalid and needed resubmitting on the correct form. Not ok, the delay not ok at all, but - no choice, so ok, resubmitted.
6 weeks later, we have just had it back again. With no explanation, a letter requesting more:
To help me consider the matter, please send me the following documents. Please send originals not copies.
1. Detailed bank statements covering the last 6 months for both yourself and your spouse.
2. Most recent Council Tax bill
3. Further documentary evidence from March 2007 to March 2009 for yourself and your spouse, or addressed jointly to both of you.
This on top of 13 pieces of documentation already submitted, which covered letters from 4 different banks, 3 utility companies, the local council, the NHS, and HMRC, etc
The only tiny bright spot is that they returned my passport (not my wife's though).
We are visiting her family in California in 3 months. When I booked flights, they were nearly 7 months after the form submission date. I am getting to the stage now where I'm actually worried about this going through in time.
Is this normal?? Why? Our situation is about as standard as it possibly could be. I've been in the same job the whole time, we've been at the same address the whole time after 2 months living at my parents', we've had a child, we provided marriage certificates, there is just nothing weird about our submission at all. We even ticked the "I confirm I have never committed war crimes or incited others to do so" helpful check-box...
Would it help if we claimed she was fleeing religious persecution? Or if she had no savings?
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.
That is all - thanks.
When we first got married, we had to request permission as she was on a visitor visa at the time. We then had to fly to the US, request a spouse visa for her from the US, before returning to the UK. This was an annoying process, but ok.
The initial spouse visa expires after 2 years. After this time you then need to apply for indefinite right to remain, and prove that you are still married and living together, etc. Annoying process, but ok.
The above costs £750. Not ok, not ok at all, but no choice so, ok.
You have to apply within 28 days of the 2 year visa expiring, but not before. You have to submit both partner's actual passports, and they don't guarantee any time frames (usually between 4 and 10 weeks). Not ok, I sometimes need to travel for work, but no choice, so ok.
You have to submit a long chain of original documentation, including bank statements, signed statements from family-members for any periods where you lived with relatives, payslips, and a large quantity of proofs of address from approved sources like utility companies. They request 10 items which show both you and your partner's names together. As my wife is a stay-at-home mum, obviously not many bills are in a joint name, so we included those that were (council tax bills a year apart, water bills, etc) as well as a covering letter as requested explaining why not, and excessive quantities of official documentations showing both our names at the same address separately from each other. Very, very annoying process, but ok.
You have to submit on the approved form available online. I downloaded and printed this form, spent a long and careful time completing it and gathering documentation over several weeks, and then submitted at the required time. I was charged the full £750 within 3 days of doing this. 5 weeks later I had everything returned - in between printing the form and submitting it, they had issued an updated form on the website (no changes relevant to our application), so the application was invalid and needed resubmitting on the correct form. Not ok, the delay not ok at all, but - no choice, so ok, resubmitted.
6 weeks later, we have just had it back again. With no explanation, a letter requesting more:
To help me consider the matter, please send me the following documents. Please send originals not copies.
1. Detailed bank statements covering the last 6 months for both yourself and your spouse.
2. Most recent Council Tax bill
3. Further documentary evidence from March 2007 to March 2009 for yourself and your spouse, or addressed jointly to both of you.
This on top of 13 pieces of documentation already submitted, which covered letters from 4 different banks, 3 utility companies, the local council, the NHS, and HMRC, etc
The only tiny bright spot is that they returned my passport (not my wife's though).
We are visiting her family in California in 3 months. When I booked flights, they were nearly 7 months after the form submission date. I am getting to the stage now where I'm actually worried about this going through in time.
Is this normal?? Why? Our situation is about as standard as it possibly could be. I've been in the same job the whole time, we've been at the same address the whole time after 2 months living at my parents', we've had a child, we provided marriage certificates, there is just nothing weird about our submission at all. We even ticked the "I confirm I have never committed war crimes or incited others to do so" helpful check-box...
Would it help if we claimed she was fleeing religious persecution? Or if she had no savings?
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.
That is all - thanks.
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Comments
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Hi, As a NZer I totally sympathise. The process for me was quite straight forward as I am from a "colonial" country and have vcertain rights to be here (my grandparents were born here). After marrying I wanted to get a UK visa. I have lived here for 11 years, my children were born here, my husband is a UK citizen and all I want is to be able to walk through the same entrance when I enter the country as my family.
But I have to pay around £1000 to do so. I can't afford it and so have to remain a NZ citizen when I really no longer want to be. Why is it so expensive?
Just another rant to add to yours.
Hope you and wife get it sorted. it really is a difficult process. I guess to put people off!0 -
Can't really help but just wanted to add something:You have to submit both partner's actual passports, and they don't guarantee any time frames (usually between 4 and 10 weeks). Not ok, I sometimes need to travel for work
A lot of of the staff where I work have to travel abroad, and they have a second 'business' passport (a copy of the original one) for this purpose so that if they ever need the original for something like this then they can still travel. If this is a process you will have to go through regularly, then you could look into getting one of these?As my wife is a stay-at-home mum, obviously not many bills are in a joint name
I was under the impression that all bills can be addressed jointly regardless of employment status and which of the couple physically pays them, my parents bills are always in joint names even though my mum was a sahm, and all me and DH's bills are in joint names even though only one of us pays them. Maybe this would help if you had to go through this process again?
Just some things I thought might make it easier if you have to apply for this visa again.0 -
Yeah - to your point Honeypop, we probably could have had some bills addressed in joint names and in hindsight it might have helped; we assumed that bills and statements to us separately at the same address would be just as good - apparently they may not be.0
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I know exactly how you feel. We are going through a visa process right now for a spouse visa for my husband so we can move to Australia.
We have to provide evidence of our relationship dated photos, invitations etc. Thing is over the last 6 years of our relationship we dont have a lot of this sort of stuff. And as I lived with him in his house for a few years I am also not on any bills so no idea how we can provide this information.
It does sound and feel like a lot I know but unfortunately its a necessary evil.
If I were you I would be getting on to them asking about the process due to your impending trip. Its too big a risk to take for her passport not to be back in time.
Good luck with it all I hope you get some answers soon. x0 -
Yeah, I just pointlessly called and ranted at them but the people you speak to are not the processors, so they just suggested that I put it all in writing when I respond with the requested documentation.
I am tempted to just put everything from my employers, a utility, bank, card co or gov agency from the last 2 years in a big box and send it all...0 -
You have my sympathies but the US immigration department are just as bad if not worse! They just love admin,forms and red tape.
You would think that with all this "special relationship" guff we keep hearing about,things would have been made smoother between US/UK with regard to migration issues.0 -
When my husband came here from the states he had to go to Chicago to get his entry visa, I had already come back to sort out housing, job, etc. He went by himself with our marriage certificate, proof of our savings, bank statements, afadavit from me, photos of us, of our wedding, of holidays we'd been on together, proof we had somewhere to live together, etc. He got turned down because they didn't believe the marriage certificate was real. He had to go back and get a letter from the secretary of state to say it was real. This was 11 years ago and I know things have got a lot worse. When he got his indefinite leave to remain I think it was free of charge, or at least hardly anything if it did cost. Now if he wants to apply for citizenship, he has to give his passport over for who-knows-how-long, £1k and all of our private everything (I do wonder if they want to check the labels in our underwear tbh).
Because of all that (mostly because he can't afford not to have his passport for months on end) he hasn't bothered to get citizenship.0 -
KellyWelly wrote: »When my husband came here from the states he had to go to Chicago to get his entry visa, I had already come back to sort out housing, job, etc. He went by himself with our marriage certificate, proof of our savings, bank statements, afadavit from me, photos of us, of our wedding, of holidays we'd been on together, proof we had somewhere to live together, etc. He got turned down because they didn't believe the marriage certificate was real. He had to go back and get a letter from the secretary of state to say it was real. This was 11 years ago and I know things have got a lot worse. When he got his indefinite leave to remain I think it was free of charge, or at least hardly anything if it did cost. Now if he wants to apply for citizenship, he has to give his passport over for who-knows-how-long, £1k and all of our private everything (I do wonder if they want to check the labels in our underwear tbh).
Because of all that (mostly because he can't afford not to have his passport for months on end) he hasn't bothered to get citizenship.
I know,,,its quite incredible isnt it? Especially when you contrast yours and similar situations with the hoards of migrants who blag their way into the UK from Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe,seemingly with little difficulty.0 -
Hi,
We recently had to apply for my husband- we paid £950, went to the centre in Croydon and had the ILR granted within 2 hours. It was very straightforward, we took all our documents and the assessor just picked and chose what he needed, and that was it.
It is annoying to pay that amount of money for 2 hours of work, but in the end at least we had all the documents and passports returned in the same day.
We know people who have done the postal application and had their passports back within 4 weeks, and certain people have had to wait 6 long months - it's purely luck!
Hopefully you will get your wife's passport back in time.0 -
apart from writers in the daily mail, i don't think anyone thinks it is 'hoards' of non-EU migrants.;)I know,,,its quite incredible isnt it? Especially when you contrast yours and similar situations with the hoards of migrants who blag their way into the UK from Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe,seemingly with little difficulty.
actually, given the complexity, expense and time required for a genuine application, it's hardly surprising that some people do choose not to go through the proper channels! sounds like a nightmare - can't give any advice, only sympathy with your justified rant!!:happyhear0
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