sarahtw

Please can you tell me how long it is possible to leave the UK for in each calendar year if you are granted a spouse's settlement visa? I believe that it is up to but no more than 180 days each year but do not know if that is right or whether the time runs from the date you enter the UK, the 1st of January each year or some other date. Any help would be much appreciated.

Also, please can anyone tell when the visa is valid from eg if we say in our application that we want to enter the UK on 1 July 2015 and apply now, will the spouses visa be valid for 3 months from that date or will it be valid for 3 months from when the visa is granted?

Many thanks in advance, Sarah

WEBlue

The time spent living in the UK is counted from the date your visa is activated at the UK border. (This is why you should never enter the UK for the first time on your spouse visa via Dublin/RoI, where stamping is not done.)

For FLR or ILR, time spent outside the UK is not asked for on either application, so it's not really a factor. Where it DOES become important is for naturalization, i.e. when you apply to become a British citizen.

For naturalization/citizenship, you must be careful not to exceed 270 days outside the UK in the 3 years prior to your application, & no more than 90 of the 270 can occur in the previous year. You must also be certain that you were IN the UK on the exact day 3 years before you apply for citizenship.

**Note that the British citizenship requirement for spouses/partners is 3 years--however, the ILR requirement (under the new rules as of July 2012) is 5 years, and you must have ILR before you apply for naturalization. So in effect it takes 5 years to get both ILR and citizenship (though the citizenship application only scrutinizes your last 3 years.)

As I understand it. the spouse visa itself cannot be post-dated more than 3 months ahead of the application or processing date (not sure which one). So gauge your application time for around three months ahead of the time you wish to arrive to be safe.

That said, the spouse visa itself is VALID for 33 months, and you can enter the UK on it any time before it expires..... However, if you enter more than 3 months AFTER the start date, you'll run into problems with needing to apply for an extra FLR in order to cover your time to manage to make the 5 years to ILR.

sarahtw

Thanks very much for your helpful advice. Much appreciated! Kind regards Sarah

WEBlue

You're welcome -- good luck!