Dear All
I have been seeing my Australian girlfriend for 20 months but we have only officially lived together for 9. Unofficially (no documented proof) we have lived together for nearly 12 months. For the period before we lived together we have proof of our weekend visits to each other (twice per month)and also, prior to us moving in together, I spent a month with my girlfriend at her parents home in Australia. Do you think we have to wait the full "official" 12 months of living together before applying for my De facto visa?

Advice much appreciated.

I'm in a similar position. When I applied in June this year me and my girlfriend had
proof we'd been living together for about 7 months, but before that I was working
away from home, and we didn't have good evidence that we shared an address. During
this time we were together every weekend, which was as much as was possible under the
circumstances.

We've been asked for additional information on this period. The letter from DIMA
(London) said that the 12 month period is pretty pretty much mandatory, although it
also seemed to say that you might be able to justify it if you weren't living
together for at least some of that time. That's what we tried to do, backing it up
with stat decs, phone bills etc.

The definition of what's needed to prove a 12 month de facto relationship seems to be
a bit woolly, the phrase they use, "Living together or not permanantly apart" doesn't
really help much.

We're still waiting to hear the outcome, so I'll let you know!

Ben

alan douglas <[email protected]>
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