Eff1n2ret

I'm not sure if we need to do a police report as we might simply have left the old passport in the house in London. Last time we remember definitely seeing the old passport is about 2 months ago, and we've been to Bangkok and Hong Kong since then.

She's been in and out of the UK already on the current passport, but was carrying her old passport, with the ILR stamp in it at the time. I think I just need to find out if the embassy will put a right of abode stamp in her current passport so we can travel back.

I assume, being British, that it will cost an arm and a leg (or two), but that it should be possible. However, do I apply at the embassy? or do I have to go through VFS even though she's not applying for a visa, and doesn't need all the accompanying paperwork that they "check" just to get a stamp showing her current status in her current passport.

(I do have a photocopy of the ILR stamp so it should help confirming her status)

Edited: typo

References to "Right of Abode" and "being British" make this post slightly confusing, as it is only British Citizens who have Right of Abode.

However, I assume that all that is being asked is whether the OP's missis having mislaid her old passport with the ILR endorsement somewhere, can trot along to the British Embassy and simply get them to put an ILE stamp in her current doc.

Judging by this from the Entry Clearance Guidance, I don't think she can:-

"ECB17.1 Visa transfer or visa replacement?

Where an applicant's passport expires during the validity of a multi-entry visa the visa may be transferred to the new passport at their request. The transfer fee will therefore apply. If, however, the applicant loses or has their passport and visa stolen, we are issuing a replacement visa and the full fee is required. If the applicant applies for a replacement visa you will need to see a Police report and all supporting documentation. This also applies to replacement 'leave to remain' granted in the UK."

But it's probably worthwhile getting an answer from the Embassy before going through the turmoil of an application via VFS, if you can find someone to talk to. Producing a photocopy of the old endorsement might just persuade them to treat it as a transfer, but there's still a fee.

It might be less hassle to get someone to break into the house in London and if they find the old document, DHL it to Thailand.

What you have posted suggests that you have done everything correctly, and UKBA made an incorrect decision because they failed to distinguish between a genuine self-employed EEA national from one of the "A8" countries, and an employed worker from one of those countries, who needs to be enrolled on the Workers Registration Scheme (which means they have to serve 12 months before a family member can qualify for a Residence Card).

It looks to me as if the EEA2 form is correct. It doesn't cost you anything to make an application, and if it was me I would not go to the expense of paying a lawyer. Just apply again, with all the evidence you have listed, and a covering letter pointing out that you are a self-employed person with an absolute right of residence under the EEA Regulations, quoting Para 3 of their own Casework instructions as found on this page:

http://www.ind.homeoffice.gov.uk/siteconte...pdf?view=Binary

State that you are not required to enrol on the Workers Registration Scheme, and there is therefore no qualifying period for your husband to be issued with a Residence Card as an EEA Family Member.

Very good luck to you. We need all the dentists we can get. Don't worry, as I said to you before, even if your husband's family permit is out of date, he can not be treated as an "illegal".

40 - 30

New balls please!

The visas are ok for the dates of travel you propose. They could have post-dated them to start on the date you declared which would have been a problem if you arrived before the starting date - in all probability they would have been denied boarding by the airline.

If I may say so, I don't believe you've had very good advice from the "home office helpline". What they have told you is correct for employees, not for self-employed people from the group of countries that joined the EU in 2004.

If, and only if, you are genuinely self-employed, you don't need to register under the Workers Registration Scheme. You should, however, have registered yourself as self-employed with HM Revenue and Customs. If they have recognised you as self-employed, and you can produce accounts which show that you are trading as self-employed, you should be able to apply for a Residence certificate for yourself, and a Residence Card for your husband without waiting for one year. These are not "visas" granted under UK Immigration Rules, but simply documents recognising your rights under EU Law, and you should not have to pay for them.

In my opinion your whole case depends on how genuine is your claim to be self-employed, and whether you are recognised as such by the tax people. If you've done things properly, you should be able to get your applications for yourself and your husband accepted straight away under EU law. But I think you should probably consult a properly qualified immigration lawyer before doing anything else.

There is nothing illegal about your husband extending his Armenian passport in London, even if he doesn't have permission to stay here, and the Armenian authorities have no power to "deport" him from the UK, nor is it their duty to report him to the Home Office. Also, whether or not his Family Permit has expired, if you are in one way or another a "qualified person" to remain in the UK under EU law, either as a "worker" (employee) or "self-employed", there is no way your husband can be arrested for any immigration offence, because he will not be an "overstayer" as defined under Section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971. So the worst that can happen to him is that no employer will give him a job until he has a Residence Card - but if you're running your own business he could always work for you!

So even if you can't get things sorted out straight away and his Family Permit expires,and you don't want to pay a lawyer, don't worry, because nothing very terrible is going to happen to you.

Hi

Can anybody tell me what application form should non EEA family member of EEA (who's nationality is LAtvian) use when applying for UK residency? My husband has applied under EEA2, but it was rejected b/c I (EEA family member) am self-employed here in UK less then 1 year. We moved here in may of these year. And we can't apply under FMRS, b/c i can't be registered in WRS. I talked with an adviser on help line but any way they say to me that we need to apply under EEA2.

Can anybody please help us by giving advice what to do for extending stay of my husband here?

My husbands visa is ending soon and i'm tottaly lost now. I don't know what to do.

Many thanks in advance.

Presumably the advisor confirmed that unless/until you've been working here for a year your husband doesn't qualify for a residence card, as per this from the EEA2 application form:-

"15 FAMILY MEMBERS FROM THE ACCESSION STATES (this

part applies only to applications for a residence card)

If your family member (spouse) is a national of one of the 8

relevant Accession States i.e the Czech Republic, Estonia,

Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia or Slovenia

(Cyprus and Malta are exempt), and you are not yourself an

EEA national, you will not be eligible for a residence card

unless your family member has completed 12 months’ continuous

lawful employment in the United Kingdom and is

eligible for a registration certificate."

You haven't stated your husband's nationality or how long he's been in the UK, or what sort of visa he has at the moment, so it's difficult to suggest how he might extend his stay here.

Alternatively, if he stays on and keeps his head down until next May, the fact that he's then here illegally will not disqualify him from an EEA2 application.

Just returning to the original query regarding the company Funsail's requirement for a 50,000baht deposit or the hirer's passport, for comparison I looked up the booking conditions of Sunsail Thailand, who are of course part of a large international group, and their booking form emanates from Australia. There is no mention of depositing a passport, they take a blank credit card impression to cover loss or damage under the excess on the insurance policy - which is what you'd expect from a reputable commercial company, and is also the practice with the car rental company I deal with in Thailand.

So Funsail operate under the local Ways and Means Act, and it's purely a risk assessment whether any of their customers want to hand over their passports. I wouldn't.

I'd be interested to hear from the OP when/if he's completed his charter with them.

I've flown with Eva several times, always economy. The food BKK-LHR is ok, LHR-BKK it's dire, and they serve the smallest measures of wine I've ever seen in a glass, with little opportunity for a refill. But they're efficient, and frequently competitive on price for a direct flight.

UK expats living in the European Economic Area see their UK pension rise with the cost of living, but others in some Commonwealth countries do not.

Sadly not very Thailand-related.

It is a matter close to the heart of anyone retired in, or in my case about to retire to, Thailand and whose pension is frozen.

It's difficult to justify the current discrimination, and I hope that the European Court will overturn it. However, if they do, I'm not optimistic that the UK Government won't find some way of maintaining the status quo.

That's a sorry tale of events.

You maybe have a misconception about the effect of appeal hearings, which function merely to overturn or uphold the original decision, but there's rarely, if ever, any comeback on the original decision-maker. One might feel that this is a weakness, because if individual ECOs were shown to have an abnormally high rate of overturned decisions at appeal hearings, it might highlight one or two who need remedial training, or transfer to another job.

The real offence in your case is the time taken to make the original decision, but particularly their failure to consider your further representations promptly when it was clear that time was of the essence. I doubt whether the case got referred to the UK - it probably got no further than the Entry Clearance Manager in Bangkok (if there is one at present), but he/she is in my opinion the real culprit.

My grateful botty is blowing kisses already...

I'm amazed you haven't been able to open some sort of bank account, particularly if you have an O visa. I've had a BKK Bank passbook account with an ATM card for the last 3 years, despite having nothing but 30-day visit stamps at the time. I load it up via a straightforward internet transfer (foc) from my UK bank to my account at Moneybookers (google it), and from there I download it to the BKK account. Last month I transferred 5000 sterling, it cost £2.99.

Doubtless you could register your g/f's account if you sign up with Moneybookers. But I'd have another go at opening your own - if you're out in the sticks, try in Bangkok.

Having been to three Thai events in the last couple of months, as I was strolling round in the biting wind and drizzle at one such yesterday, it occurred that they're all a bit "same old, same old", from the drab tents selling overpriced beer, to the feeble simulations of Thai boxing and other traditions. The food stalls are usually ok, but not wonderful value.

I wondered whether they could be spiced up in some way, perhaps to give a more authentic flavour of Thailand to reflect the preoccupations of many contributors to this forum, with events such as:

The Soi Cowboy Bar

- with lots of girls, of course. "Hallo, how are you, where you from?"

Pay a barfine to enter the "Discover the Katoey" competition.

A Demonstration of Thai Driving Skills

And a competition to guess how many tons can be piled on the back of a pickup.

The Family Buffalo Stall

It's sick. Try and guess what's wrong with it.

Get arrested for Overstay/Drug Smuggling/Shoplifting from King Power

And have a thrilling experience of staying in the Bangkok Hilton!

I'm sure there must be other exciting ideas for next year's events - any offers?

if they fly to a visa exempt country for thai people with a stopover in the UK then they can disembark and go through UK customs without a visa.

this has been done in amsterdam many times by people (non EU familymembers of EU citizens) who couldn't get a schengenvisa.

Indeed, a wheeze that has led to the nationals of no fewer than 56 countries currently requiring "Direct Airside Transit" visas to have connecting flights via the UK. Thailand is not yet one of them.

So, hey, get a visa and ticket for Bolivia or somewhere, and turn up at the passport control at Heathrow. They'll make you feel really welcome.

The way i see it is they can join the Mother can they not just arrive and exercise their rights as family members ?

Hang on, your the immigration advisor. Whyre you asking questions?

He's advertising his new Teleporting service for getting people to the UK without visas.

"Beam me up, Scotty!"

we have been seperated now for 4 mths,this could pose a major problem.

It will indeed, as your marriage has ended, so has her right to stay in the UK. I'm sorry, but you patch things up or she leaves.

thanks for ur replies ,,,but i dont think the above reply is correct,,u see as ive explained the eea is not the same as holiday/spouse/or any other visa, also did u take time to read that my wife had a baby 4 mths ago born here in uk? so she cannoty be shipped out....

please only those in the know about eea permit reply here as i dont want to get wrong information....i have spoken to thai visa express today very briefly and they were more than helpfull but im going to wait to see what kind of information i get from people off this forum before i agree to pay for thai visa express services....

If she's on her 5-year residence card and has only 2 years to go until she acquires "Permanent Residence", as implied in your first post, I guess she easily fulfils the criterion for retaining her rights under EEA law, i.e. married to you for at least 3 years and spent at least one year together in the UK. This being the case, she doesn't have to leave.

I think her twins are qualified simply by virtue of being her children - see this from the UKBA Casework instructions:

"2 Family Members - Categories

The family members of an EEA national are defined in regulation 7 and regulation 8 of the 2006 Regulations.

2.1 Key points

The family members of an EEA national include his/her:

• Spouse / civil partner (excluding a person who is party to a marriage or partnership of convenience - see Chapter 5 of the ECIs).

• Children of the EEA national or of his/her spouse / civil partner who are:

•

Under 21; or•

Dependants."

Establishing that she is continuing to exercise her treaty rights and that they are her children should be sufficient to have them granted EEA Family Permits. But get a second opinion to make sure it's watertight. Some ECOs might try and make life difficult if they thought you as the EEA national would no longer be involved with the family.

I am just in the process of updating my will prior to retiring to Thailand, which is specific to my UK assets only (which will be the bulk of my estate), as I wished to save my executors the pain of trying to track down whatever I accumulate in Thailand. My solicitor's advice was to make another will in Thailand covering my assets there, which I will leave exclusively to my wife, but to be sure to instruct whoever drafts it not to revoke my English will.

Could anyone tell me if the 3 year rule for a spouse applying for British Citizenship is about to change to a 5 year probationary period at the end of 2009? What are the new rules specific to British/Thai or other foreign marriage situations and have they received final approval yet by HM Gov?

Many thanks.

The 2009 Borders & Citizenship Bill passed into law in July. The various provisions will be implemented by Statutory Order later on - info on the UKBA website says that the "Earned Citizenship " provisions, which will amend the requirements for naturalisation, will be commenced in the Summer of 2011, so it's reasonable to assume that applications made before then will be on the current criteria.

After that it looks as if the qualifying period for those who had leave as a spouse will be 5 years, which can be reduced by 2 years by doing charity or voluntary work. They call it "speeding up the path to citizenship for those who contribute to the community by being active citizens."

If you declared your dates of travel on the application form, they should have picked this up and dated the visa accordingly. This from the Entry Clearance Guidance:-

"ECB9.5 What if applicant is not intending to travel straight away to the UK

The ECO should check the applicant's visa application form (VAF) for the proposed date of travel in order to prevent unnecessary applications for an extension of stay, and possible claims for a refund of the extension fee.

Where an applicant may not intend or be able to travel to the UK immediately following their application: the ECO has discretion to defer the 'effective' date for up to three months after entry clearance has been authorised."

It's their cockup - go back and ask them to re-issue the visa with the correct dates.

................ but has never done immigration stuff.

None of the people now running the UK Border Agency have - draw what conclusions you will from that.

You cannot get ILE as she has not passed the KOL test and she can only do that in the UK. She could come on a family visa (you are her family as long term relationship for these purposes) and she could do the KOL test. After returning to Thailand, she could apply for entry with no limits and no restrictions based on your having a 4 year relationship outside the UK.

Whether your still being married would have any bearing on her settlement visa I do not know. I guess someone somewhere is going to ask why you didn't get divorced.

If she is otherwise qualified for settlement, she would be granted 27 months and could apply for ILR in the UK at any time after passing the KOL test.

So if he can prove 4 years' cohabitation, and show that his previous marriage has irretrievably broken down (I guess commencing divorce proceedings would be sufficient), she can apply for ILE.

If he can't show enough to prove 4 years, then if his former wife will cooperate, he should be able to show that he will be free to marry within 6 months and get her a fiancee visa (his g/f, not his former wife ).

If an Italian wished to take his Thai wife to visit Italy, she would have to pay the Italian charges for a Schengen visit visa. If he wished to take her to the UK, she would be entitled to a Family Permit free of charge.

It's the law.

As already pointed out, the card does not replace the passport as a travel document - this from the UKBA website:

"If migrants travel outside the United Kingdom during their time here, they need to show the card together with their national passport at the port or airport when leaving the United Kingdom. They must also show their card and passport at any overseas port or airport before starting a journey back to the United Kingdom, and again when they re-enter this country, to prove they are allowed to return to the United Kingdom."

If you were to apply for a visa/family permit for your wife to come on a visit, she should be given an EEA Family Permit, as per following in the Entry Clearance Guidance:

"....... if a family member who is travelling with, or is to join the EEA national in the UK requests a visit visa under the Immigration Rules, you should offer him (or her) the option of applying for a family permit under EC law free of charge."

The treaty rights of EEA nationals include the free right of movement between member countries for any purpose for up to 3 months, and in coming back to the UK for a holiday you are exercising your treaty rights under your Irish citizenship. If your wife already has a Family Permit, she shouldn't have to get another one, and it's inconceivable that she would be turned away because you were no longer resident in the UK. The concept of "change of circumstances" which may be applied to visas issued under the UK Immigration Rules would not be relevant here.

I wouldn't like to pronounce on her right to Permanent Residence when the Permit expires, however.

As far as I can see, there is no "family visit visa".

There are no less than 10 separate forms for different categories of visit visa. Application Form VAF1B is designated "Family visitor". Hence we speak of "Family Visit visas". Geddit?