Was Your Thai Girlfriend/Wife Refused A Uk Visa? What Do You Think Were The Reasons?

[MaiDong]

I've got another concern 7by7(or anybody else!), my mum has the front summary page of her bank statements which includes full names, address, money in, money out, account details etc? And do they really need to be originals or can she scan and email them to me?

Thanks again for any help you can offer

[7by7]

From Supporting documents

You must include the original documents and a photocopy of each document you choose to submit. Please ensure that the photocopies are good quality and can be easily read.

From How to Apply

You must provide original documents with a photocopy of each original document you are submitting (including your passport photograph page). In particular, you should include original documents relating to birth, marriage, divorce and death. If you are not able to include originals of these then you should send certified copies. Failure to submit original documents or certified copies may mean your application is delayed or refused.

They are reluctant to accept uncertified copies or email or other internet printouts due to the ease with which these can be forged.

Are you sure that you need your mum's financial support? As you will be staying with her your expenses will be minimal; maybe your own resources will be enough.

[MaiDong]

Thanks for another informative reply 7by7, I really appreciate your effort!

I'm just covering all possibilities, surely it would be wise to include as much as possible, as so many people have said in previous threads of this nature?

Don't you think the bank statements are necessary?

EDIT/ My own financial resources may be adequate in my terms, but I only have records of my bank transactions - they're not unhealthy but as my mum will be the sponsor in the visa application wouldn't it be helpful to have her details too?

[surayu]

Congratulations MaiDong , i had a friend which obtained a visa for his unmarried partner on the ground that his son with her, was too young to travel alone(in Italy), also, being the UK part of the EU, i believe you can also apply under those sets of law(EU) instead of the UK ones that i recall some "professional" told me were more restrictive (so might be worth have a look into it in case you get problems with your application), sad to hear the son/daughter of a british person can't automatically acquire the citizenship of his parents , in Italy it's seen as a basic right, anyways all the best and lets hope for the better, good luck!

[MaiDong]

Congratulations MaiDong , i had a friend which obtained a visa for his unmarried partner on the ground that his son with her, was too young to travel alone(in Italy), also, being the UK part of the EU, i believe you can also apply under those sets of law(EU) instead of the UK ones that i recall some "professional" told me were more restrictive (so might be worth have a look into it in case you get problems with your application), sad to hear the son/daughter of a british person can't automatically acquire the citizenship of his parents , in Italy it's seen as a basic right, anyways all the best and lets hope for the better, good luck!

Thanks mate, hope you're well, how's the house?

Anyhow, I think recently things have tightened with the UK giving out passports but yes I agree it should be automatic that my son, and many others get a passport! We're not the ones in charge though!

I also don't think the people deciding my wifes visa application give two hoots about EU law, they've probably been told by the home office to be more strict if anything.

[surayu]

Yes in the end the people granting or not the visa are the same, but this option (if it can be applied and i believe it can) put you under a different set of requirements, if you have the right to stay in a country and can prove that your immediate family members will not be a burden to the government, being reunited with them is a basic human right you have, now i never made any indept researches into it, but it might open up an easier path to follow...

The house project is going slower then i previously thought, as i wasn't expecting locals to take their life the way they do but it's ok, i can cope with this slow motion feature now, also much more space around to get busy, the city's life was getting too tight for me, i guess i must to be a country man at hearth

[NanLaew]

Right, mum found her 'Official copy of register of title' so that's being copied and emailed to me.

The 6 months of her bank statements will be huge, she's renovated her house and has had lots of work = lots of funds in and out of her bank. the problem is this, I've read that original documents are needed so she'll have to apply for a statement from the last 6 months from the bank, wait for it to arrive at her house, then physically send it here, doesn't that seem a bit absurd? Surely they can't need this?

VFS accepted a downloaded copy of my bank statements when doing successful UK visit visa applications for my wife. Six months of my original bank statements would also have been a sizable bundle (if I had them) since the mailed statements are on silly little sheets of paper that go to my UK address! The downloaded version was a page and half.

My wife has had 2 successful UK visit visas issued; the first the standard 6 months (6 months requested) and the latest a 2 year (1 year requested). Both applications were supported with details of MY reason to return to Thailand as, like your wife (Congratulations!), my wife didn't have any other reason to return to Thailand apart from "return to the family home with husband and son". Thus the onus was on ME to prove my links with Thailand, visa status, work, etc..

Secondly, we stayed at my fathers house but since I was funding the travel, all he supplied was a letter stating that we would have a roof over our heads at his house and stating that he was retired and had been living there for 20-odd years. There was no house titles or the like provided.

Good luck... I think you will have no worries as long as every statement made is 100% honest and verifiable.

[theoldgit]

VFS accepted a downloaded copy of my bank statements when doing the successful UK visit visa application for my wife. Six months of my original bank statements would also have been a sizable bundle (if I had them) since the mailed statements are on silly little sheets of paper that go to my UK address! The downloaded version was a page and half.

Likewise I submitted printouts from my bank when I sponsored my partner and the UKBA did not query them and the visa was issued, I think they can and do check if they suspect some impropriety, and if ascertain that forged statements have been submitted then you, or rather the applicant, would have a problem.

Going back to 7by7's point, it seems that the trip is affordable to the OP so does he need his mother to act as sponsor?

[7by7]

MaiDong, you are the sponsor, not your mother. Your mother is offering financial support, which is different to being the sponsor of the application. If you can afford the trip yourself there is no need for your mother to offer this financial support and so no need to provide any of her financial details at all.

Surayu, as MaiDong is a British citizen his wife cannot apply for a visa to the UK under the EU regulations; she must apply under the UK immigration rules.

The same would be the case for the wife of an Italian citizen applying for a visa to Italy; EU regulations wouldn't apply, Italian immigration law would. Italy is, of course, a member of the Schengen area, so a visitor would apply for a Schengen visa; but the UK is not a Schengen member.

[MaiDong]

MaiDong, you are the sponsor, not your mother. Your mother is offering financial support, which is different to being the sponsor of the application. If you can afford the trip yourself there is no need for your mother to offer this financial support and so no need to provide any of her financial details at all.

Surayu, as MaiDong is a British citizen his wife cannot apply for a visa to the UK under the EU regulations; she must apply under the UK immigration rules.

The same would be the case for the wife of an Italian citizen applying for a visa to Italy; EU regulations wouldn't apply, Italian immigration law would. Italy is, of course, a member of the Schengen area, so a visitor would apply for a Schengen visa; but the UK is not a Schengen member.

I'm not paying for the trip, I can't show proof that I can afford to pay for the visit, it's my mum who is providing all the financial support for the visit, so surely she's the sponsor?

[theoldgit]

I'm not paying for the trip, I can't show proof that I can afford to pay for the visit, it's my mum who is providing all the financial support for the visit, so surely she's the sponsor?

In which case yes, she might also want to include a note explaining why she is paying for the trip.

[surayu]

Surayu, as MaiDong is a British citizen his wife cannot apply for a visa to the UK under the EU regulations; she must apply under the UK immigration rules.

I know but as many times i have seen fellow countrymen making recourse to the big daddy (the EU) when they couldn't get what they should be entitled to but local italian laws denied it, surely being the UK a EU member state, he might be entitled to some sort of recourse too, immigrations laws however might be a bit more tricky to over-rule, here is what i have been able to find so far on a brief googled research, unfortunately i am not able to make some more researches right now as i will be away from my keyboard for a few days, it's an interesting reading though:

As you are a UK citizen you cannot use the EEC route. You have

to use the UK marriage visa route.

1. An exception to the above is where a British Citizen

returns to settle in the UK after spending a 'long' enough time in a third EU

country exercising treaty rights as the original poster intends to do in

Ireland. 'Long' has been deemed in case law to be 6+ months. You can in this

case apply for your dependents (wife and children) to enter the UK under the

principles of EU law i.e. you are treated as if you were an EU national coming

to exercise treaty rights in the UK - your dependents would thus be entitled to

return to the UK with you - this is known as the Surinder Singh route to family re-union after

the case law establishing it.

2. Mr Singh an Indian national was married

to a British Citizen. Mr. Singh's wife went to work in Germany and was

accompanied by Mr Singh. She then wanted to return to the UK but the UK

government insisted that Mr. Singh meet the relevant requirements of the

immigration rules to re-enter the U.K. These conditions are more stringent than

those under EU law - the courts ruled that Mrs Singh was being prejudiced in

relation to other EU nationals entering the UK. Accordingly the courts ruled

that British Citizens who had been exercising treaty rights in a third EU member

state would have their re-entry or rather that of their non EU dependents based

on EU law.

3. Your family will be entitled to an EU Family Permit issued

free of charge. Expect the Entry Clearance Officer at the British High

Commission, Dublin to 'grill you' on whether you went to Ireland in order to go

down the EU route and avoid the more rigorous 'UK immigration rules route' for

your spouse/ children to enter the UK for settlement. You need to provide proof

of exercising treaty rights in Ireland i.e. payslips and/or tax returns for

employment/self employment. You also need proof that you are returning to settle

in the UK at the post 6 month stage i.e. have a job offer and accomodation

sorted out. Another catch is that if you go the standard 'UK immigration rules'

route your wife will get ILR in two years. If you go down the 'EU law' route she

will be eligible to apply for ILR after 4 years. During this time she must have

been self employed/ employed or otherwise not in receipt of state welfare unless

exempt e.g. child benefit.

[7by7]

I'm not paying for the trip, I can't show proof that I can afford to pay for the visit, it's my mum who is providing all the financial support for the visit, so surely she's the sponsor?

In visa applications the sponsor is the person with whom the applicant has the relationship upon which the application is based; in this case that would be you (it is, of course, not necessary for a visit applicant to have a sponsor at all).

The finance for the trip may come from the applicant themselves, their sponsor (if any), a third party or any combination of these. Whoever is contributing toward the cost needs to show that they can afford to do so.

If you cannot show that you have sufficient funds to pay for the trip and are relying on financial help from your mother, then as said before she will need to provide evidence that she has such funds.

Surayu, the Surinder Singh ruling only applies if the EU national has been exercising an economic treaty right in another EU state and is returning to their home state with their non-EU national family members. This is not the case here as MaiDong and his family live in Thailand.

[MaiDong]

I'm nearly at the submitting stage but we've got a question, we're having to complete an application for our 6 year old son and lots of the information is irrelevant but we're worried that leaving information out will complicate the application, has anybody had any experience with this?

MD

[MaiDong]

I'm nearly at the submitting stage but we've got a question, we're having to complete an application for our 6 year old son and lots of the information is irrelevant but we're worried that leaving information out will complicate the application, has anybody had any experience with this?

MD

ALL DONE NOW

[MaiDong]

Wife & son are now proud owners of 6 month UK visas!

Thanks everybody for your help, much appreciated!

Visas came in 5 days too!

[NanLaew]

Nice work! Congratulations.

Save all the paperwork for reference and see you again soon.

[MaiDong]

Nice work! Congratulations.

Save all the paperwork for reference and see you again soon.

Thanks! Yes don't worry, all the paperwork is locked away for the next time, everything was returned to me too, I thought they kept the copies of everything, it also seemed like nothing had actually been looked at, all my postit note references were attached, all in the right order, almost as if they didn't look

[Castor83]

thought id throw my story in briefly. just because i think it illustrates there is no real agenda with the immigration folks. they simply work to their rules.

my wife and i got refused our first visa attempt. we werent married then. she was an illegal immigrant in uk when we met. but to behonest im pretty sure thats not why they refused the visa.

to be honest i did it a bit half arsed i think. plus i answered one of the questions wrong which was a bit stupid. we didnt really have much evidence of a relationship either. although she was pregnant. but all we had was a few photos which werent dated and of no real obvious places in uk... couple from london and stuff like that.

anyway after the refusal i got my arse into gear. we put in letters from people who knew us, the pub landlord, doctor who we;d been to seewhen she got pregnant, family members and friends. i had pretty much every text message we'd exchanged still saved on my phone cos i never delete them, so we put all those in too. some other stuff aswell. i forget what. but on the advice of my solicitor as i was goin to thailand anyway, we got married and i changed my passport to irish and applied for a EU permit thing, because its free and we had nothing to lose.

we got that really quickly. nowhere near as long as

that one came through within a few weeks i think. everyone said how silly it was that it got refused as a british citien, but as an EU citien it went through quicker and easier. but im pretty sure that wasnt the whole story.

it was simply that we had enough evidence the second time (probly conbined with the extra stufff we sent for the first app.) and it was obvious we were tellin the truth.

anyway i just thought id add that. hopefully people can relax a little bit, i kno there is alot of talk about quotas and "useless" ECOs and i just genuinly dont think any of that is the case...

good luck to all who are goin through the process. patience is a virtue