Help! Life In The Uk Test.

[aland2012]

Hello All

I'm living in the UK with my Wife from Thailand. She is here on a Spouse Visa, we got married in BKK May 2011.

Her Spouse Visa & Passport is in her name before we got married.

While she has been here for 8 months now, she has Joint Bank Account, NI Number, Doctors, and a part time job all in her married name ( my surname ) .

She went to do the Life in the UK test today, but got refused because her passport has a different surname on it, from all other documents. I gave them : Joint Bank Statement, Her Payslip, Married Cert, GP Registration, all in her married surname.

I spoke to the lady their at the test center, she said, " the photo id surname has to be the same as her postal address postcode "

What do I do now???????? can i change her passport surname to mine here in the UK????? Or do I change all her documentation with everyone to her old surname????? PLEASE SOMEONE HELP !!!!

Alan Day

Edited August 2, 2012 by 7by7
Font altered; please do not post all in bold. See forum rules.

[Sarge7]

The first thing you should do is speak to the Manager at the Test Centre .This is the advise of the UKBA website.

Many partners adopt & exclusively use their spouses surname which holds the same legality as their passport name.

You only require one document to satisfy the Postal Code requirement in addition to photo ID . A translation of marriage certificate would obviously be required to confirm ID of residence of passport holder & British surname.

Two of my wifes friends recently took their tests & the Centre were satisfied on production of marriage Cert.

Good luck. Sounds like an officious clerk

[aland2012]

My Wife told me that on her passport she only looked at her passport information at the front of her passport. She didn't look at her spouce visa stamp, which in the type section spouce has my name and date of birth.

Edited August 2, 2012 by 7by7
Reason for edit Font altered; please do not post all in bold. See forum rules.

[aland2012]

Also, this is the second time my Wife went to this test center, the first time she went and sat the test ok, but failed. I gave my wife the same paperwork just updated bank statement.

So you can see I am sooooooooooooooo confused

Edited August 2, 2012 by 7by7
Reason for edit Font altered; please do not post all in bold. See forum rules.

[7by7]

I agree with Sarge7.

Particulalrly as you say she has sat the test befoe at the same centre.

Go back with her and demand to speak to tyhe manager over this. If you have further problems, refer them to their website. 6. What ID do I have to bring to the test?

If you have registered in your married name and your ID is in your maiden name, you must bring an original UK Marriage Certificate to support this. Without this UK Marriage Certificate, your test will be refused and you will not get a refund.

Seems to me they owe her a free test.

[aland2012]

With the Quote above. it says you have to bring your original UK marriage certificate . that's ok if you were married in the UK. But we were married in BKK that's why we have a spouse visa.

I spoke to the manager at the test center. He said they Don't accept any marriaged certificate from abroad. ??????? And this is new from UKBA. ???? I told him that also my wife has already sat that his test center and already done the test but failed.

[aland2012]

They also said they don't accept Bank statements and Mobile phone statements any more. has to be council tax billing gas electric .

[7by7]

Sorry, my mistake for not noticing the 'UK' in the note.

However, a Thai marriage certificate accompanied by a certified translation is a valid legal document in the UK. From the Bangkok embassy's guidance

The Thai marriage certificate will be in Thai language only. You may wish to commission a “sworn translation” of the marriage certificate from license translators, so that you can use the document for legal purposes in the U.K

(My emphasis)

If the manager of your local centre wont be moved by this, then all I can suggest is that you make an official complaint.

Making a comment or complaint

[Thongkorn]

7by7 is correct the marriage certificate is a legal document. also My wife has added My surname to hers . all her docs from the bank , her job are all with my surname on them. I pay my Council tax by bank direct debit and she is not even on it. the same as all the Utility bills. I think the person who is in charge of the center you went to to take the life in the UK test does not know what his/her jobs. don't just take what they have said as correct.

Edited August 3, 2012 by Thongkorn

[jessicanguyenself]

They also said they don't accept Bank statements and Mobile phone statements any more. has to be council tax billing gas electric .

That is not true , I have just passed my Lituk test on the 27 of July and I did use my bank statement for my proof of post code , my statement was not even a proper statement it was an online one that I printed out at the bank's computer and one of the lady works at the bank just put their logo stamp on my statement .

[Guest jonzboy]

One has to wonder about the purpose of providing a postcode reference document. As far as I can fathom you still do not need to be resident in UK in order to take the LITUK test. Two years ago my wife took the test whilst on a two week visit to UK. As I recall, in order to comply with this requirement we temporarily amended her bank account address from overseas to my mother's home in UK and got a statement sent there.

If you take things to another level, what happens if someone decides to live in a hotel or serviced apartment where your name will never appear on any of the document types that they are Pparently insisting upon.

[jessicanguyenself]

One has to wonder about the purpose of providing a postcode reference document. As far as I can fathom you still do not need to be resident in UK in order to take the LITUK test. Two years ago my wife took the test whilst on a two week visit to UK. As I recall, in order to comply with this requirement we temporarily amended her bank account address from overseas to my mother's home in UK and got a statement sent there.

If you take things to another level, what happens if someone decides to live in a hotel or serviced apartment where your name will never appear on any of the document types that they are Pparently insisting upon.

You did not need proof of post code two years ago but you do need now as failing to do so then you won't be able to take the test . If you settle in the UK how come you do not even have a bank account ? or anything with your name on ? remember the people doing the test are the people who seek to settle in the UK

[Guest jonzboy]

Jessica

Proof of postcode was required two years ago. My wife took the test as mentioned and passed thankfully and, because of our 4 plus years of living together overseas, was granted ILE a month later. We moved to UK and then set up accounts etc. the new rules mean this option is not available, so I guess nearly every new applicant for the test will already be inside UK on a settlement visa. So, back to my point, what is the purpose of the postcode. What does in prove? Surely all one needs is a formal ID document, normally the passport being used to enter UK. After all, an applicant can legitimately move home the day after the test and have a new postcode.

[jessicanguyenself]

I am also married to my husband for over 4 years and have lived outside the UK too . We have just moved back to the UK late of June and i took the test and past around a week ago . Applied for ILR using their premium service ,I hate the fact that waiting for 6 months and not knowing the outcome .

[aland2012]

I sent the manager and email and spoke to him explaining our story. The manager had a board meeting in Saturday about this situation.

I received an email Saturday saying Sorry for the mistake. I must say the manger was very professional about it. So all good then.

[Amoudi]

I am also married to my husband for over 4 years and have lived outside the UK too . We have just moved back to the UK late of June and i took the test and past around a week ago . Applied for ILR using their premium service ,I hate the fact that waiting for 6 months and not knowing the outcome .

Hi Jessicanguyen,

So u have applied for ILR? Why didnt just come to uk for the Life test then come back to VN apply for ILR or ILE so u don't have to wast ur time twice ( I guessed that u moved to UK end of June with ur husband on settlement visa 27 months which u applied when u was in VN and waited for 12 weeks?). My suituation is similar to ur, married and live our side of UK for over four years, I did uk life test in Apr when I came to UK last Apr then back here and I applied for ILE in June and still waiting for the result:-), 31st of this month will be 12 weeks So finger gross :-). And why u have to for 6 months to get ILR? Here they told me 12 weeks but still wait and see.... Good luck.

[jessicanguyenself]

I am also married to my husband for over 4 years and have lived outside the UK too . We have just moved back to the UK late of June and i took the test and past around a week ago . Applied for ILR using their premium service ,I hate the fact that waiting for 6 months and not knowing the outcome .

Hi Jessicanguyen,

So u have applied for ILR? Why didnt just come to uk for the Life test then come back to VN apply for ILR or ILE so u don't have to wast ur time twice ( I guessed that u moved to UK end of June with ur husband on settlement visa 27 months which u applied when u was in VN and waited for 12 weeks?). My suituation is similar to ur, married and live our side of UK for over four years, I did uk life test in Apr when I came to UK last Apr then back here and I applied for ILE in June and still waiting for the result:-), 31st of this month will be 12 weeks So finger gross :-). And why u have to for 6 months to get ILR? Here they told me 12 weeks but still wait and see.... Good luck.

I think u misread what i wrote , I said I applied for my ILR using premium service so i did not have to wait for 6 months to know the outcome , ILR using postal service here takes within 6 months for the result . My settlement took me roughly 2 months not 12 weeks . Acutally we did not plan to move to the Uk untill Feb this year so no time for us to mess about with the test and I did not have any study material with me either .

[7by7]

There seems to be some confusion here.

It's all a bit academic as ILE for spouses and partners has been abolished for applications made on or after 9th July. (Don't panic, Amoudi, you applied before 9th July.)

However:-

Indefinite Leave to Enter was issued outside the UK and the processing time is the same as for other settlement applications made at the same time to the same embassy.

Indefinite Leave to Remain is issued inside the UK and postal applications typically take between 3 and 6 months. If you are prepared to pay a premium fee you can apply in person for a same day decision.

If applying outside the UK and you satisfied all the requirements for ILE except the knowledge of life and language in the UK requirement (KOL) you were issued a 27 month visa known as ILE (subject to KOL). However, you could apply for ILR as soon as you had satisfied KOL by passing the LitUK test or improving one level on an ESOL with citizenship course; you did not have to wait until you had been living in the UK for 24 months. I understand this is what jessicanguyenself did.

KOL can only be satisfied in the UK, but if you had previously satisfied KOL whilst in the UK as, for example, a visitor then, assuming all the other requirements were met, you would have be given full ILE and did not need to apply for ILR once in the UK. I understand that this is what Amoudi is doing, having applied before 9th July.

Whether people felt it was worthwhile to make a special visit to the UK just to take the LitUK test was up to them.

[jessicanguyenself]

7by7 is correct but I did not even have the right visa either , British embassy in bkk granted me a usual spouse visa not the settlement subject to KOL , we managed to sort them out ok though .