hi all,

Thanks to this website most of my visa questions/problems have been answered and i am a regular reader of whats going on. In the summer i will be going back to thailand for 3 months to stay with my GF. last christmas was my turn to thai and next year should be her turn to travel to the uk. before i arrive i want to prepare all the documentation and hand it in so that we can book flights/make plans early etc... However, we plan to get married in august (a couple of months later) and i am worried about the implications this might have on changing her passport, Id, getting the visa transfered to a new passport.... does anyone the procedure after getting married that you need to renew your passport within a certain time? and how would i get the visa transfered if i needed to do this before travel? if i had booked flights already by this stage i presume that she would only need to show a copy of our marrige certificate and her old passport to explain the difference in passenger name? She is planning on keeping her last name but adding mine on the end if this makes any difference.

thanks for any help

sorry i should have done some searching before...

After a bit of reading around it appears that if her name changes you apply for a new id card and some people think she then needs a new passport OR you submit the translated marrige certificate and they add a stamp in the passport explaining the name change.. can any one confirm either option? (perhaps one is outdated) if the passport was renewed i assume the visa would become obsolete but somone posted that the old passport with visa in could be shown? doesnt sound right so am a little confused? Perhaps if she just changed her name from miss to Mrs would be simplier, from what i have read this would just require an Id update? would the passport have to changed aswell or miss to MRS can be over looked?

thanks again.

The name change stamp in her passport will not invalidate the visa as there is a clear link.

Renewing her passport would not invalidate the visa. If the expiry date of a visa has not passed then the visa is valid even if the passport it is in has expired. Simply show both old and new passports and if the names are different the marriage certificate/translation of same.

Whatever route you choose, the name on her ticket must match the current name in her current passport.

Maybe the easiest solution would be to delay the name changing until after her visit.

My wife changed ID card the same day.