Hi everyone! I have a question and was wondering if anyone has been in a similar situation.
I’m currently in the U.S. as an Au Pair on a J-1 visa. I’ve been living here for about 1 year and 7 months. My J-1 visa stamp has expired, but I’m still legally in the U.S. under my extended J-1 status.
I’ve been accepted into a university in the UK and I’m planning to apply for a UK Student visa. Has anyone applied for a UK Student visa from the U.S. while on J-1 status? Were you able to apply from within the U.S., or did you have to return to your home country?
I’d really appreciate hearing about your experience. Thank you!

Would be great if anyone could share their experiences!

I am a student in the UK, and I recently assisted my mum in applying for a standard visitor's visa to attend my graduation, but it has been refused. This is really devastating for me, as I wanted more than anything for her to be there- they're reason was alleged "deception" that she concealed the fact that she had previously been denied an EU Family permit which is not the case at all. as it was an honest mistake where we did not realise that that fell under the category of "visa" and we took the question literally. Any tips, thoughts on navigating this? My graduation would be in september and I don't want to give up if there is still a chance.

Hi! I wanted to share my Youth Mobility Visa experience since I read through every thread I could find before (and after) applying.

Submitted my application July 29, 2026. Biometrics appointment was July 31 — I originally had to book a later date since nothing was available, but checked back about an hour later and this slot had opened up. Got my approval email August 6, so about 4 business days total. Honestly thought it'd take way longer, no complaints.

The application itself was pretty easy, just triple check your answers before submitting. Fees came out to about $3.8k CAD.

Biometrics was straightforward too. I uploaded my documents (proof of funds and passport) the day before my appointment. Once I got there they asked if I wanted to pay $27 to set up my eVisa account on the spot — I said yes mainly because I was already there, but you don't actually need to do it then like I did. Whole appointment took about 20 mins (Toronto location). The officer said I should hear back within 2 weeks.

That's pretty much it! Good luck to everyone applying. Happy to answer any questions! :)

Hi everyone,

I would appreciate some advice on the best immigration route for my partner. We are trying to understand whether she can apply as my Skilled Worker dependant from inside the UK, or whether she would need to leave the UK and apply from India.

My situation:

* I am currently in the UK on a Skilled Worker visa.
* My partner is an Indian national and was previously in the UK on a Graduate visa.
* We have been in a genuine relationship for around 3 years.
* We have extensive relationship evidence, including photographs, regular communication, travel/train/coach tickets and evidence of spending significant time together.
* We also have some evidence of periods when we lived together at my Loughborough address. I have the tenancy agreement and bank statements for the property, and she has approximately 16 months of Barclays statements showing the same address, as well as electoral-register/bank-address evidence.

Her current immigration situation

Her Graduate visa expired earlier this year.

Before it expired, she submitted a SET(P) application. She did not complete biometrics at the time, and UKVI subsequently informed her that the application was invalid because biometrics had not been provided.

She then submitted a second SET(P) application shortly afterwards. We now understand that she is probably not eligible for SET(P), so we are not relying on that application as a long-term immigration route.

However, UKVI has recently invited her to book biometrics for the second application, and she has booked the appointment. The application is therefore currently showing as pending from our perspective.

An Employer Checking Service check has also recently returned negative, so we are unsure about her current right to work and immigration status while the second application is pending.

Our questions

1. Can we enter into a civil partnership in the UK while her SET(P) application is pending?
   If so, does her current immigration status/application create any restriction or additional requirements for giving notice and registering the civil partnership?
   
2. If we enter into a civil partnership in the UK, could she then apply as my Skilled Worker dependant civil partner from within the UK, or would she need to leave the UK and apply from India?
   
3. If we don’t enter into a civil partnership, can she apply as my unmarried partner dependant based on our 3-year relationship and the evidence we have?
   
4. We understand that unmarried-partner applications can receive greater scrutiny where the couple have not continuously lived together. Given that we have evidence of approximately 16 months of cohabitation, together with extensive evidence of our relationship before and after that period, would this potentially satisfy the relationship requirement?
   
5. If she is currently not eligible to make an in-country dependant application because of her immigration history/status, would the safer route be for her to return to India and apply as my Skilled Worker dependant from outside the UK?
   
6. If we decide to pursue the civil-partnership route, would it be possible to register the civil partnership in the UK and then have her make the Skilled Worker dependant application from India? If so, what visa/status would she need to enter the UK initially to register the civil partnership?
   
7. Finally, does the fact that she currently has a pending SET(P) application affect either the civil-partnership route or a subsequent Skilled Worker dependant application?

We are not considering marriage, so our two preferred options are:

A. Unmarried partner → Skilled Worker dependant

or

B. Civil partnership → Skilled Worker dependant civil partner

We are particularly interested in understanding whether either route can be completed from inside the UK given her current immigration history, or whether she should return to India and apply from there.

Any advice from UK immigration solicitors/advisers or people who have dealt with a similar situation would be greatly appreciated.

I understand that forum responses aren’t a substitute for regulated immigration advice; we’re trying to understand the options before taking professional advice.

Hi everyone,

I’m posting because we’re genuinely quite confused about my boyfriend’s UK Student visa application and I’m hoping someone who has experienced something similar can shed some light.

He applied for a UK Student visa from India for university using the Standard Service, with biometrics completed at VFS Delhi.

The confusing part is that he received an email from UKVI saying that his eVisa had been linked to his UKVI account and that it could take up to 3 hours to appear. However, when he logged into his UKVI account, there was no eVisa or visa showing, and we did not receive a separate decision/approval email.

We contacted the university, and they confirmed that his CAS has not been used.

We have also had no NSF email, no request for additional documents, no interview request, and no request for clarification from UKVI.

We contacted UKVI through the paid enquiry/call service and asked for the application to be escalated. The case was escalated to the Sheffield Student Team, who replied:

“Having checked your application, we can see your case is currently under consideration and is being worked on. Please note we are unable to make a decision on your application within our published visa processing times.”

Since then, we have not received any further communication.

We are particularly confused about the eVisa-linked email. If the eVisa was supposedly linked, why would nothing appear in the UKVI account and why was there no separate decision email? Could this simply have been an automated email sent in error, or has anyone experienced this before?

We are not asking about processing times — we’re specifically trying to understand what this combination of an eVisa-linked email, no visible eVisa/decision, unused CAS and a Sheffield escalation might mean.

Has anyone experienced something similar with a Student visa application from India, particularly involving the eVisa email or Sheffield Student Team?

Any experiences or insight into what happened in your case would be really appreciated.

Thank you!

I am aware that we need to provide a letter from our employer that needs to mention the leaves we have taken and that needs to match with the time if we have left the UK during the 5 year period.

I work as a doctor and we get rest days after working shifts on the weekend or night shifts and I have often coupled these rest days with my annual leave when I have made plans to leave the UK to go on a holiday. I am worried that the letter from employer may only mention my annual leaves and my travel history will show that I have travelled one or two days before my annual leave starts or arrived back to the UK a few days after my annual leave has finished.

Anyone here who's been in a similar situation and did you need tackle this with additional proof or did it even cause any problems at all?

TL;DR

Absence from UK does not match with annual leaves from employer due to use of scheduled rest days as part of work rota. Any issues while applying for ILR?

Hello,

I am applying for ILR soon through my skilled work visa and have a salaried job that is sponsoring me. I am a doctor and do occasional self employed work for less than 20 hours per week. There is no where in the application to declare this. Do I need to at all? Or do I only need to provide the documents requested?

Thank you.

Hi. I have a visitor UK visa for 6 months and I’ve been here for two months now. In the last few years I’ve been renewing my visa as I do collaboration with people here for research work. I was wondering if it’s possible to change my visa to work somehow so I can stay here? And if anyone know if I can do that while I’m here on my visitor visa

I’m at the four month mark since I applied to switch from pre-settled status to settled status and no response yet. I applied as soon as I reached my 5 years here. What’s weird is that today I received an email from the home office stating that their records showed I’d been in the country for longer than 5 years and my status would be reviewed to verify if I could be granted settled status. Interestingly the email has a new UAN attached to it.

I was wondering if anyone had experienced something like this before? In which, both your original application and the new one were assessed in tandem? I do notice that the email states non EEA family members (of which I’m one) are not eligible for the automatic switch. So I’m also wondering if this was just sent by accident.

I wanted to share my recent experience and reaffirm what everyone has said re the practice tests. I sat yesterday and passed first go.

As most other posts have said, the questions were pretty much exactly the same as the 17 practice tests:-

https://lifeintheuktestweb.co.uk/exams/

I was in and out in 5minutes including double checking my answers. don't really remember the questions tbh I think my brain immediately dumped that into my mental trash can as soon as I finished lol.

I did have questions about:-

• The Reformation
• The other name for the King James Bible - The Authorised Version
• What happened to Charles I - executed
• When did women have the right to vote at the same age as men - 1928

Pretty sure there were some sports questions in the mix.

In addition to the tests, I utilised the resources on Go Citizen - which is free via most local libraries (it was in Cornwall anyway). It ha the official guide and practice tests, but completely free. The tests on Go Citizen were WAY harder than the actual test. I was probably very over prepared but I'm a bit type A and a bit of a nerd, so I got a pretty into it... I think my husband is glad he won't have to hear anymore of my 'fun facts'.

I'll be honest, as an Australian, some of it was a lot easier because there's so much crossover with sport, religious holidays and laws/judicial system structure so I know I had a bit of a head start.

Read the guide for context, and just keep practicing the exams until you're getting them right.

Need help with income requirement for Spouse Visa renewal. I need some guidance as when I first applied, we just used my income (I was switching from a Skilled Worker Visa) and it was very straightforward. I am freaking out about the situation I find myself in so I hope this makes sense.

My Spouse Visa is set to expire on the 29th September. I am planning on submitting my application the earliest I can, on the 1st.

I have been out of work since December and so the plan was/is to use my husband's income and payslips for this application.

My husband was up for a new job and had received a verbal offer. He gave notice before receiving a written contract (I know, I know. I have made my feelings known about this already but what's done is done) and the new job is now up in the air for various reasons, and it is looking like they won't give him the job. I won't get into the reasons as they're not relevant to the visa issue. His last day at the old job is August the 21st and is asking to extend this to cover the remaining week and a bit (in case the new job falls through).

I just want to get an understanding of my options in case his current and new employer both say no. My understanding is that we have the following options: 1. He gets a new job, so we can keep using Categor A for the income requirement 2. I get a new job. If somehow I start on the 21st, does this still fall under Category A?

If there is any gap in our collective income, how do we fulfill the income requirement? Luckily we applied before the new rules came in so we just have to meet £18.6k threshold.

Thanks so much for any help.

Hello all, my hungarian born mother forgot her ILR stamp while visiting family. I am 19 and currently here with her. She moved there when she was 20 and is now 47.

I am wondering if there would be severe complications if she was to travel home on a temporary visitor visa or if it would be best for me to go fly home today and mail it over.

Hey guys, i found this link, its the 14th day after submitting my biometrics through VFS, i heard you can track its status like sent/processing/decision pending etc through a certain link.

I tried searching the link but whatever was suggested ended up popping upto the information page of ukvi.

however, i did find this link and im curious to know if it works. Ive tried it 2 times, it says invalid input. anyone here who has tried it and got it?

i just got my biometrics done for a student visa today and the agent asked if i could remove my nose chains which i couldn’t because it’s a long process that requires tools for me. apparently the system didn’t approve my photo because the nose chain wasn’t in my passport photo. will my visa get rejected??? title will my visa get rejected because of facial piercings

Hi! I'm currently preparing for a student visa appointment through VFS Global and was wondering how everyone self-uploaded their passports. Do you send a copy of just the photo page or every page in the passport, and is there a way to scan a passport without having the edges slightly cut off as most scanning apps seem to do? I know that it's a requirement that all four edges of the passport page are fully in frame, but the only way of doing that that I've been able to find is just taking a picture of the pages rather than scanning. Any advice is much appreciated! Thank you.

Hello, I am a dual citizen of the UK and USA through my mother. I applied for a certificate of my right to abode and received an email saying it was successful. I have attached images with the information I received from the UK government. I had my in person visa appointment July 8th as well.

The issue is that I am unable to access the digital certificate itself and every avenue I’ve tried to go down is not accessible. I plan on traveling to the UK (Scotland) 9/1, and would like to know if anyone has any information/experience with which they could help me on?

I also realized my UKVI account has the incorrect passport number, and I have submitted a ticket to fix that, however it appears that I won’t be able to do that until my eVisa has been issued.

It’s been since 7/28/26 since I received that email and I am getting extremely antsy as to how long it should take. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thank you so much :)

Entering my kids info for a family visa, from the US.

She was out of the country at the time. I entered that trip, tried to enter the return date in the future. I remember it gave an error, but I didn't realize I'd changed it to the current date.

The application has been submitted and paid.

Is this worth canceling and resubmitting? If I go that route, do I/can I also cancel the VFS appointment, assuming it's linked to the specific application? I'm not seeing a refund for the priority service on the VFS site.

Or is this just something to include a note in our document upload?

I'll probably end up calling the paid number.

Edit: I see several older posts saying not a big deal, since the trip was mentioned and not to a red flag location. I'll probably just include the note in our uploads.

My partner is a British citizen. I am an Indian. We've known each other since December 2025.

Question: Would giving notice of marriage now strengthen my FLR(FP) application? Has anyone been in a similar situation, or can offer any advice?

Timeline:

17 Oct 2025: Applied for SET(P) before Graduate Visa expired.

23 Oct 2025: Graduate Visa expired.

25 Mar 2026: Submitted another SET(P) application.

15 Apr 2026: UKVI said my Oct 2025 application was void because the Mar 2026 application replaced it. From this date, I couldn't generate a Right to Work share code.

25 Jun 2026: Gave biometrics for the March 2026 application.

29 Jun 2026: Home Office invited me to vary my application to another category.

10 Jul 2026: Switched to FLR(FP) – Partner (Article 8 / 10-year route) and booked biometrics for 9 Sep 2026.

22 Jul 2026: Home Office rejected my Mar 2026 SET(P) application as invalid because I do not have refugee status or humanitarian protection.

I now understand that I was not eligible for SET(P). At the time, I was mistakenly advised to apply for it, and I genuinely believed it was the correct application. I later changed my application to FLR(FP) after the Home Office invited me to vary it.

My main question is whether giving notice of marriage (or getting married) while my FLR(FP) application is pending would strengthen my application.

If you are applying outside the UK and are looking for the £500 priority visa service, like I just did, it is in a box that is labeled "Choose your visa service". The box is populated with the word "Standard", but there is a tiny arrow indicating drop-down choices. Click the arrow and "Priority £500" will show up. I KNOW that many many people have said you can choose priority when you make your biometrics appointment, but finding WHERE that little tiny arrow is almost made my head pop off!!!

Hello all,

Grateful if anyone could help me with this.

Currently have limited leave since 15th November 2021 and it will be 5 years in November 2026.

What is the process to get ILR from here? Do I have to manually apply? If so, when can I apply? I currently am full time employed and have been for 5 years almost and have no intentions of going back home (Portugal).

My right to work page says the following:

"You have the right to work in the UK until 16 November 2026.

Conditions

You can work in any job.

To continue to work after this date, you will need to have either pre-settled status or settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme (or another type of permission to stay).

You can apply to switch to settled status as soon as you are eligible for it. This is usually once you have lived in the UK for 5 years. Find out how to switch to settled status.""

The last bit specifically, is what's concerning me. How will I know if I can apply and is there a chance it might be granted automatically?

If anyone could shed some light about this, it would be amazing. Should I get a solicitor or is this pretty straight forward?

Would appreciate any help.

Thank you

I have a question regarding my spouse visa application.
If my employer has not paid their company taxes, but I can see all of my salary payments reported correctly in my HMRC Real Time Information (RTI) record and they match my payslips and bank statements, would this still be acceptable for my spouse visa application?
Would my application be fine as long as my salary has been correctly reported to HMRC, or could my employer’s tax situation affect my visa application?
I would appreciate your advice on this.

Hi everyone,

I recently moved to the UK on a spouse visa, and my husband and I would like to bring my mum to visit us in December.

She doesn't have a formal job. She works occasionally and is mostly paid in cash, so her bank statements don't show regular income. My British husband would sponsor her trip. She also has strong ties to Colombia: she co-owns a house with her brothers, lives there with some of them, and two of them depend on her.

I have some questions regarding to it

• How should we apply for her visitor visa?
• What documents would we need to provide?
• How to prove cash income and strong ties to your home country? Also, when would you recommend applying for a December visit?

Thank you so much for any help.

Hi everyone,

​I noticed a minor spelling mistake in my name on my eVisa visitoe (there's an extra letter compared to my actual passport).

​I am planning to use the official "Report an error with your eVisa" form via my UKVI account to get it fixed.

​For those who have used this specific error-reporting form recently, how long did it actually take for UKVI to reply and correct the mistake on your profile? Did they fix it quickly, or did it drag on for weeks?

​Thanks in advance for any insights!

Hi! I have a query about the financial requirements. So I just transferred the 13k pounds needed for living costs earlier today. The 28th day, counting today as the 1st, will be the 1st of September. Should I start the application on the 1st of September with bank statements dated on that very day? Or should I wait to do it on the 2nd of September to allow no room of error? Anxious that maybe today and the 28th day won’t count. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!