An application for entry clearance (visa application) as the Spouse/Civil or unmarried partner (herein after referred to as ‘spouse’) of a person who is, either a British national or settled in the UK i.e. in possession of Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR), is the first step to settlement in the UK as the family member of the said person.
Visa applicants under this category must not only meet the requirements, as enlisted under Appendix FM of the Immigration Rules, in order to make a successful application but also sufficiently evidence the same in the manner prescribed under the Rules.
There are five major criteria of requirements which the applicants have to meet in order to be eligible for application under this category, they are:
The person you are applying to join in the UK, as their spouse, must be either;
*For the purposes of the application and ease of communication, the person you are applying to join in the UK is referred to as the ‘Sponsor’.
The applicant is required to provide sufficient evidence of their genuine and subsisting (on-going) relationship with the sponsor.
In this digital age, it should not be hard to provide proof of your relationship, especially with Facebook and Instagram! Immigration Rules do not make it that easy for the applicants, especially with the rules regarding documents which may be submitted to evidence your relationship with each other.
Here are some of the documents you may provide in support of your application as evidence of the genuineness of your relationship:
It is pretty tricky to evidence an unmarried partnership, naturally, as there is no government issued certificate which confirms your relationship! However, unmarried partners are required to provide evidence of having lived together for 2 years in a relationship resembling (akin to) marriage.
The applicant must evidence adequate financial stability in order to sustain themselves in the UK without taking recourse to public funds. This may be done in multiple ways and in different permutations and combinations of income (of the sponsor) and cash savings (of the applicant and sponsor).
In order to be eligible to apply under this category of visas, your sponsor in the UK would have to meet a certain level of income i.e. your spouse would have to be earning a minimum of £18,600 per annum (year).
The sponsor’s income could be from either:
In order to meet the financial requirement through this route, the sponsor and the applicant would have to evidence cash savings amounting to £62,500, held in their names.
If you are unable to meet the financial requirement through one of the above ways, you have an option of combining the income of the sponsor and savings (of the applicant and sponsor).
Your sponsor may be exempt from meeting the income threshold of £18,600 if they are in receipt of any of the following benefits from the UK government:
*Note: In the above circumstance, you would still need to evidence adequate maintenance funds available for your life in the UK, without recourse to public funds.
The applicant must provide evidence of meeting the English language requirement, along with their application. They are required to have sufficient proficiency of the English language, equivalent to CEFR (Common European Framework for Reference for Languages) level A1 and the same could be evidenced through either:
You may be exempted from meeting the English language requirement if you could evidence:
The applicant would have to evidence that there is adequate space for them to reside at the sponsor’s place of residence in the UK or any new accommodation which you intend to live at once you enter the UK.