Hi Everyone,

I hope someone can help me. My girlfriend and I are intending to get married in England in a Church of England ceremony. We live in Thailand and are not intending to settle in England, so I'm pretty sure she does not need a Fiancee or Settlement visa. However, I'm not sure if she might need a Visit for Marriage visa. Reading the guidelines, this seems to apply only to civil weddings conducted by a Registrar in a Registry Office. The Vicar has told me that she only needs a tourist visa and that he needs to see only her birth certificate and does not need to see her passport and visa at all. Can anyone confirm or refute this? Especially from personal experience?

The vicar is not wrong as it is his (or her) call to decide whom he shall marry in his (Anglican) church. However, as your girlfriend will anyway have to apply for a visit visa, she may as well go the whole hog and get a marriage visit visa. My concern would be that if she were to apply for a visit visa and to then get married, the visa officer might, in relation to any subsequent application, consider that she'd not previously disclosed a material fact.

Visit visas and marriage visit visas are the same price and the only difference in qualification is the requirement for your fiancée to demonstrate that she intends to marry whilst visiting the UK. Confirmation of this from the vicar, including time, date, place, names of the parties etc., should suffice.

Scouse.

Hi Scouser,

Thanks very much for the advice, we'll go with your "belt and braces" approach as the safest way forward.