DonH

Hi everyone
We're a family of 4, my wife being the UK citizen, myself and two boys (5,7 yrs) requiring visas. The savings amount we've accumulated is to meet the requirements of the sponsor not having a job or job offer. The savings have been in our accounts since Feb this year, however as things go with living expenses, it appears we meet the savings requirement some months and perhaps just under on others. So my question is how the minimum savings amount is calculated for the 6 month period preceding the visa application?

Question 1 - In our case the combined total goes from well over the required minimum in some months to just short in other months (from Feb '18 to present). The average during the 6 month period preceding the application will be just over the required minimum, however will the months falling just short of the minimum mean disqualification?

Question 2 - exchange rates. Oanda is used if I remember correctly. As most of the funds are in foreign currency, how is the exchange used? Exchange rate average for each month, average for the 6 months or a fixed rate which the visa office publishes periodically?

Thanks.

BritInParis

1. The savings need to be above the required amount for the entire six month period. If it dips below that amount then the clock is reset from that point.

2. It’s the exchange rate on the day of application.

Are you sure that your children require visas? Was your wife not born or naturalised in the UK? Are they not your wife’s biological children?

DonH

Thanks for the answer BritInParis. According to your answer 1. we then need to check our spending going forward and might have to postpone our application date And considering most of our savings is in ZAR, we'll have to keep an eye on exchange rate trends as well.

Regarding the kids, we've gone through various "reputable" sources to explore the options and most said they have to get visas. My wife's mom is born and bred in the UK, my wife born in SA. Not sure when my wife got her passport, but according to one source, there's a possibility of applying for the kids passports now, all depending on when my wife's mom applied for her daughters passport ( or something to that effect, don't recall exact details, but registration dates of something or other was a factor).

BritInParis

If your wife was born in SA then you probably will need to apply for visas for them as it’s generally not possible to obtain British passports for the second generation born overseas. Did your wife ever spend at least three consecutive years in the UK before your children were born? How old are your children?

DonH

We previously tried to figure out if my wife was in the UK for 3 consecutive years. She worked there for about 3 years with a lot of travel in Europe and a few short holidays in SA, however we couldn't patch together an exact timeline from her passport stamps. This was during early 2000's. Would this info be available from the Home Office?
Kids are 5 and 7.

BritInParis

Try: https://www.gov.uk/government/public...nd-immigration