Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

Hello Forum,
I have been living in the UK for the last 7 years with an Unlimited Leave to Remain visa. My fiance and I want to move to the US to my home state of Alabama. I am 45 and he is 64. He gets a pension here in the UK. We'd like to get married here before we move. Does anyone know the type of visa he'll need to apply for and how long it might take to come through?

Any idea how difficult is it to transfer UK pension payments to a US bank account?

If anyone living in Alabama can give me a hint as to the cost of 2 person health insurance I'd appreciate it. I'm hoping to get a job that pays for some of mine at least, but with the way things are at the moment I realize that's a long shot.

Does someone over 65 become eligible for Medicare if they're not a US citizen?

Thanks, Cyn

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

I've been trawling through the wiki and I guess it's a K3, an I-129f and an I-130 we need if we get married here. I'm so confused, depressed and on the verge of a nervous breakdown over all this.

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

OMG, Should I have been filing tax returns with the IRS even though I've earned less than £25k per year? Will I be able to file these in retrospect now?

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

This will talk about health care.

http://britishexpats.com/wiki/Health_Insurance

A foreign citizen is not eligible for Medicare (with very rare exceptions). Someone with a Green Card (Permanent Residence) is not eligible until 5 years after they receive the Green Card (again with very rare exceptions depending on what state you live in). After those five years, they would need to 'buy in' to Medicare (Americans get Medicare after paying 10 years or 40 quarters worth of Medicare taxes). As he hasn't paid those taxes he'll need to 'buy in' sometime around 2017 (1 year to get GC and 5 year wait).

That is not going to be pretty.

Buying private insurance for someone over 65 is going to be quite expensive, and if they have a history of medical problems you could easily be looking at well over $1,000-$1,500 a month in premiums.

As for the taxes, others can probably address that better than I can. While you generally don't owe taxes if you make less than $90,000 a year my own personal advice is to file every year regardless. It's easier if you have a paper trail.

p.s. You should also look into FBAR. Have you had signing authority over any foreign bank accounts > $10,000 at any time during the year? You may need to investigate that as well.

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

Thanks for your message Penguin. I haven't had over $10k in my bank acct at any time so hopefully this isn't something I need to worry about. Your answer to my insurance question for my partner is staggeringly depressing. I wonder if the 10 year pay in rule would consider money I paid in prior to my move to the UK 7 years ago.

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

That money might be able to help the financial aspects of a buy in, but I don't think it will affect the 5-year-ban on new immigrants receiving Medicare. Someone may have more first-hand information on that.

You may have more luck getting him insurance as a dependent on your own insurance plan through your work, but this is really something we can't answer directly until we know the exact specifics of your health care coverage (which you won't know until you actually get a job and get the fine print of the health insurance coverage).

Generally, sorry to say, our advice when asked is "don't bring people over 65 to the USA". Yeah, seriously.

(p.s. as his sponsor be forewarned that technically you will be on the hook for his medical bills should he have an incident).

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

Welcome to BE.

I suggest you repost your visa questions in the US Marriage Visa forum. The regulars who post in there are in a better position to help you than here in the general forum.

Good luck.

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

Welcome to BE!

Don't bother with the K3, it's redundant. Get married, do the IR visa.

Get your UK citizenship first so you can come back if the move doesn't work out.

Back file your US taxes. Need at least 3 years worth I think anyway for the visa.

For insurance, one or both of you get decent jobs that offer medical insurance.

His UK pension can be paid in the US. There are old threads on this, recommend using something like xe.com as a currency exchange for better rates and stability.

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

He'll need an "immigrant visa" (IV). From start to finish, the IV process will take 8-10 months.


Not difficult at all.


Get married. File an I-130 and do not file an I-129F. Let the I-130 process and the end result will be an IV. On the day your husband enters the US, he will immediately become a US permanent resident (PR = green card) with full rights to live/work in the US.

From start to finish, the IV process will take 8-10 months... which, by the way, is exactly how long the K-3 would take except the K-3 is a lot more expensive and time consuming because your hubby won't be a PR when he enters the US and must therefore file to adjust his status from inside the US (= more time, much more money). :)


US citizens must, by law, file a US tax return no matter where they live in the world. If you earn less than the threshhold to file (I'm unsure about the exact $$), you aren't required to file.

For immigration however, you'll need to file the most recent 3 year's worth of tax returns. You'll likely have no tax burden, but you must file. The US Embassy in London has a whole IRS group who are very good with helping USC's file. Don't panic... yours is a very common situation.

Ian

Re: Planning to move w/UK partner-VISA & Insurance questions
 

Is this a UK government pension? If so, it just takes very simple paperwork to have the pension paid directly into a US bank account in dollars, with no transfer fees.