sello

Hello! My fiance and I want to get married in the UK- (he is from England and I am from the US) and then I come back to the US and I file the I-130 petition and then all of the other lovely paperwork

I read from the UK border agency that:

You must also show that:
you have enough money to support and accommodate yourself without working or help from public funds; or
you and any dependants will be supported and accommodated by relatives or friends.

How much money do I need to have to show I can support and accommodate myself- or what do I need to do to show I will be accommodated by him and his family?

Thank you!

ian-mstm

You will need a visa to get married in the UK.


Go to www.uscis.gov. Download form I-864 and the I-864 instructions. If it's just the two of you, you need to prove income at or above $18,212... or prove assets at or above $54,636.


You misunderstand. This has nothing to do with his family. As the USC spouse, you must be his sponsor even if you don't qualify financially. In that case, YOU need to find a joint sponsor (any USC or PR, over age 18, living in the US) and that joint sponsor must then make enough money or have enough in assets to cover his household + your alien spouse.

Ian

Rete

Why are you looking a website from the UK for information on US Immigration?

If you are planning on marrying in the UK you will need to get the proper paper to be allowed to marry there.

sello

I went to the UK site because I was looking up about getting the visitor for marriage visa-

This is the info I got from the site- specifically for the visa I need to get-
and it stated that I must show I have enough money to support myself- even though the visa states I can't stay more than 6 months- which I am not doing.

Rete

Okay. You are NOT asking a question about US immigration but a question dealing with eligibility for the UK right to marry document. Marriage visa is for one who is married to a Brit and wants to live in the UK.

Phew got that straight.

sello

We have started looking into the Visa I need- that is why I went to the UK border agency.

Thank you for the info on the US income requirements- I had all ready looked into that and we more than qualify thankfully.

I will contact the UK Border agency where I found the information about getting the Visa to marry in the UK.

This is what the site said:
http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/vi...tors/eligible/

Can I come to the UK as a visitor for marriage or civil partnership?
Marriage and civil partnership
This page explains how you can come to the UK as a visitor for marriage or civil partnership.
To come to the UK in this category, you must be able to show that:
you are 18 or over;
you intend to visit the UK for no more than six months, and to leave the UK at the end of your visit;
you intend to give notice of marriage or civil partnership, or marry or form a civil partnership, in the UK while you will be here;
you can meet the cost of the return or onward journey; and
you are not in transit to a country outside the common travel area.
You must also show that:
you have enough money to support and accommodate yourself without working or help from public funds; or
you and any dependants will be supported and accommodated by relatives or friends.
You must be able to produce satisfactory evidence (if we ask for it) of your arrangements for giving notice of marriage or civil partnership, or for your wedding or civil partnership to take place, in the UK while you will be here.

sello

When I have looked it up previously it was called "MARRIAGE VISITOR VISA". Am I incorrect? I was hoping someone on this message board would have gone through this- and I am sure they have- perhaps I should make a new message and title it- "Question regarding MARRIAGE VISITOR VISA"?

Noorah101

This site deals with immigration to the USA. And although there are probably some members here who have gotten married in the UK, your best bet is to go to www.uk-yankee.com and ask these types of questions over there. That site deals with marriage in the UK, visas to the UK, and all things UK.

Rene

sello

Thank you very much!

Rete

I've moved your thread into the USA forum in the hopes that there are some Brits around that can assist you with your "marriage visitor visa" so that you can get married in the UK.

JAJ

Not quite ...

- Marriage visitor visa is for someone who wants to get married in the UK, and then leave;

- Fiance(e) visa is for someone who wants to get married in the UK and then switch status in-country.

Details at: http://www.ukvisas.gov.uk

neversaidnever

I would love to jump in here, if I may:

1. PLEASE have a long hard think about why you want to marry in the UK. If your fiancee is an Brit and ever wants to get back to the USA on a K3 or CR visa, rather than through employment, then you're in for a long and arduous wait.

2. I would suggest that you marry in the US and have a blessing in the UK - this is the quickest and easiest route to your fiance being able to remain in the USA and the quickest route to CR.

I (male, UK resident) married my wife (US Citizen) in England at my parents house. It was a stunning day, but has been nothing but trouble immigration wise since - as my wife is Doctor in a residency program, she returned to the US and I was going to follow here. It's been over a year now, and still no sign of a visa solely due to the fact that we married outside of the USA.

Anyway - if you wanted to chat through this in more detail, please send me a private message and I'll take you through everything.

In answer to your direct question though - you need to be able to prove YOU have an income, and more importantly a job that you are returning to, and that you've been granted the time off from work. I would also include letters if support from his parents and your parents about who is paying for the wedding and that they will provide board, lodging etc while you're in the UK. Any bank statements showing savings or a mortgage are also useful. Allow well over 8 weeks for this to be processed.

You will also need permission from the Church (if you're having a church wedding) to marry, and for the Bands to be read in absentia, this can take a few weeks.

My wife's application was handled incorrectly by the UK border agency, we were under the impression she was allowed an cleared to travel, but it was not the case - she was arrested at Terminal 5 carrying her wedding dress with our wedding 48 hours away. Fortunately, she was allowed in temporarily (but still with a formal 'rejection' stamp in the passport) and was sent home on the first flight back the day after our wedding. Nightmare.

Basically - head to Vegas, get hitched and have a whopping big party in the UK.

sello

Thanks for your info! I want to find out as much about this as possible

Yes we will be doing the CR visa route.

I know it would be easier and quicker to be married here in the US, but there are several reasons for us to be married in the UK-we have thought about it a lot and we are prepared to wait longer than it would have taken to get the K-1 fiance visa to go through.

Thankfully I make more than enough in my job to satisfy any income requirements needed. I will have tax records, mortgage statements and anything else needed to show I will be returning to my job.

Did your wife have to provide this info when applying for the "marriage visitor visa"?

We are not doing a church wedding, but the residency and waiting times in England are quite long, Scotland doesn't have a residency period, and we can mail our paperwork in- instead of having to bring it personally to the registrar's office. So we are thinking of going to Scotland to get married.

I know hearing all this must make you cringe when you are still dealing with your nightmare- how awful it must have been to be arrested at the airport, and how sad for her that she had to leave the day after the wedding.

Did it finally all come together? Happy ending right?

meauxna

It sounds like you've had a hard time with your visa; I hope you'll consider reading/posting in the marriage based visa forum here.
It's not mandatory that one have a problem for marrying outside the US (we did, for example) IE, marrying outside the US is not necessarily the reason for the delay.

I need to add, with Moderator hat on, that we discourage asking for or taking immigration advice in private message or email, for everyone's safety.
Hope to see you in the immigration forum.

neversaidnever

Hi.

I thought this thread was moved by an admin into the USA forum? I'm new to this, so was just replying to the question.....

I'm more than happy to repost somewhere else, or maybe you could move it to the best location?

Anyway - you can get married in England without the waiting period as long as you fiance has a reasonable relationship with the local church - and by reasonable, I mean goes and asks the vicar. In my case, most of my families relatives are either 6' under there, or were married there so I plead the loyalty card.

There was a problem with the processing of her Marriage Visitor visa - in so far as they said it was processed, but forgot to send the e-mail asking for her passport for it to be evidenced properly. Thinking that it was an electronic thing (much like the visas I have for everywhere else.....) she travelled into England without it and this it appeared as 'tried to enter the country without the appropriate visa'

With regards to the waiting period - if your fiance is able to work in the country on another visa OR doesn't have to work OR is happy to leave the country every 90 days OR is happy not to be with you for lengths of time, then fine.

My job means I travel a lot, and spend significant time out of the USA, but I have now been hauled up by Dallas immigration who questioned why I was coming and going so much. They suggested I spend more than 2 weeks out of the country at any one time, and make sure it was back in my country of residence (for me this is either Australia or the UK).

Remember, if you do the 90 day stay on Visa Waiver, it is always discretionary on the day as to whether you're allowed back into the USA. It is certainly not a right - I always have to go to secondary questioning now when I enter the country, and run the risk of being denied entry.

I am currently waiting for my CR visa - as they cancelled my K3 visa. If the department of immigration think they are processing CR visas in 'acceptable time' then they can and have automatically cancelled the K3 application to go straight to CR - this is taking another 3-4 months.

Also - and I am SURE this is mentioned on other forums, they use delaying tactics such as 'your submitted paper appears to be a copy, please re-submit' when your signature was in black ink - this means they put your application to the bottom of the pile, and thus have a new deadline for processing.

Anyway - good luck with it all - I certainly would marry in the USA if I had my time again, despite the fact that we had a terrific ceremony in the end!