marcm

Hope everyone is staying safe....don't know if anyone has any insight I'm missing.
Stuck in HK currently, wife pregnant, due in October. Our plan was to return to UK in July but that has obviously now been thrown into doubt.
I am guessing we have no home office insiders here who have a crystal ball when applications will start being processed or how long they will take :-) but is it worth doing the application on the Gov.uk website first even though I can't book an appointment on VFS?
My worry is that I do that, pay close to 3000 quid and then maybe or maybe not they reopen and get an appointment but the processing takes 4-5 months and baby is due so can't travel.
Very tricky :-) Any ideas or thoughts helpful!

BritInParis

With the current ongoing closures, inevitable backlog and potential future travel restrictions I wouldn’t count on being to travel to the UK much before Christmas even if you were to submit now. Have the baby in HK, obtain its first British passport and then look to submit your wife’s application.

marcm

I think you're right unfortunately, thanks for the advice. I imagine the backlog is going to be considerable, probably two months shutdown and who knows how many pending applications already done biometrics in that time.