soyoukan

it's all about money in the UK...

1k for residency visa, more money for the NI card to work, plus the citizen test (a joke, more about buying a book and learning the content - i scored 40%)..  all in all probably around £7k to have a foreign wife come and live here.

interestingly the EU human rights act applies to people who are married to foreign nationals, to have a "life" together, and are prevented from doing so. Article 8, i believe.  however, in order for someone (ME) to contest it, you need to go to court and that costs money. 

had similar problems.

wife came for 6-month visit visa and returned home. next year applied again the same visa and was refused for made up reasons, e.g. despite a copy of marriage certificate and specifying on the form, one refusal point was because there was no evidence of UK marriage ceremony date.  duh? we're already married... lol

spent a year searching for ways to contest, dead ends. tried the tribunal, it didn't even get to a judge it was said to be incontestable (law changed 2014 to stop it).

the bottom line of refusal letter says you can reapply but there is a high chance it will be refused again - costing another £100 plus which they keep - and basically, we're living 6k miles apart for the foreseeable  future.