Failed spouse visa but with child. Please Help.

Hello please could someone give me some advice.

my wife is southafrican and was in the uk on an ancestral visa, we got married and had a child together and when her ancestral visa was coming up to expire we asked citizens advice about how we should proceed, they told us wrongly that we needed to wait for my wifes ancestral visa to expire before we could apply for a spousal leave to remain. we applied about a month after the ancestral visa had expired and today we have recieved a letter saying my wifes application has failed and she needs to leave the country immediately, obviously this is exceedingly stressful and upsetting for the entire family and i just wanted to know if anyone could give us any advice, we have an 8 month old son who has a brittish passport as do i. and i can't see what rights they have to remove my childs mother away from him? is there anything or anyone we can go to?

ryanwins1983 wrote:Hello please could someone give me some advice.

my wife is southafrican and was in the uk on an ancestral visa, we got married and had a child together and when her ancestral visa was coming up to expire we asked citizens advice about how we should proceed, they told us wrongly that we needed to wait for my wifes ancestral visa to expire before we could apply for a spousal leave to remain. we applied about a month after the ancestral visa had expired and today we have recieved a letter saying my wifes application has failed and she needs to leave the country immediately, obviously this is exceedingly stressful and upsetting for the entire family and i just wanted to know if anyone could give us any advice, we have an 8 month old son who has a brittish passport as do i. and i can't see what rights they have to remove my childs mother away from him? is there anything or anyone we can go to?

Nothing much I'm afraid. She's technically an overstayer now so she should leave asap before they force her to. She should apply for a spouse visa in SA and provided she can sneak out the UK without drama it should hopefully be a formality. However be warned overstayers are being slaughtered at the moment so you might yourself stuck between a rock and hard place.

Hi, have you spoken to the CAB about this? The way their erroneous advice could cost you thousands! Fares to and from SA! Suspect they will have an insurance policy to cover this situation.

John wrote:Hi, have you spoken to the CAB about this? The way their erroneous advice could cost you thousands! Fares to and from SA! Suspect they will have an insurance policy to cover this situation.

I think CAB has a disclaimer to thrwart legal liability..
Unfortunately, they do have the right to remove your child's mother because she has no right to remain. Have her go to SA straight away, apply for a spousal visa, explain the circumstances and it should sort itself out. Although, I guess if she was on ancestral visa, she still has some other legal basis to come back to the UK.

SYH wrote:

John wrote:Hi, have you spoken to the CAB about this? The way their erroneous advice could cost you thousands! Fares to and from SA! Suspect they will have an insurance policy to cover this situation.

I think CAB has a disclaimer to thrwart legal liability..
Unfortunately, they do have the right to remove your child's mother because she has no right to remain. Have her go to SA straight away, apply for a spousal visa, explain the circumstances and it should sort itself out. Although, I guess if she was on ancestral visa, she still has some other legal basis to come back to the UK.

This has been shockingly bad advice from the CAB. Not only does it mean she has to go to South Africa to get a spouse visa, it resets the clock for ILR (2 years) and naturalisation (3 years).

How they could even think about advising a person to let their visa expire just beggars belief.

Unfortunately, if this person had asked a question here some months ago we could have told him firstly, not to listen to the CAB advice, and also about the possibility of using the ppron method as a quick route to naturalisation (that won't work now either).

CAB are claiming they said nothing of the sort anyway, so it'd be our words against theirs. as for going back, i think she'll have to, we are going to see the immagration advisory people in hounslow on monday, hopefully they can give us some more advice, or maybe a loophole. i'm probably clutching at straws anyway, it just breaks my heart that she'll probably miss our sons first chrsitmas.

Many years ago I used to work at the CAB, detailed case notes had to be written up immediately after the interview by the advisor, and these notes could be asked for by the client. I suggest you ask them to produce a record of what was written up at the time; you may well have no legal come-back, but if it was me I would still want to see exactly what their account of it is.

I really pray for you, and feel sorry for you mate.

I was in the same position, and these b******s have no idea what is right and wrong these days, Illegal Immigrants can stay here as long as they like and legal residents and tax payers come under hell like this.

I had to go back to pakistan and didnt see my daughter for nearly a year before i was granted my settlement in uk, for two years and i have to apply for indefinite right to live here after that.

I guess that is the procedure these days, I am not putting you down but giving you an actual and factual picture of these circumstances.

It takes a minimum of a few weeks upto a year for them to check all this which alos can include a DNA test to prove relationship to the child as i had to tgo thru it.

This may be alot of information for you, but please plan your next one year based on this. YOu can appeal against this decision as well, and if you got married in uk, then i dont think anyone can stop you.


Good luck

If your local CAB is giving immigration advice they should be registered with the OISC. Contact them. It won't help your current situation, but it would hopefully keep someone else from getting such awful "advice".

Good point Yankeegirl, and indeed if they are not registered with OISC (which would totally amaze me) then contact OISC anyway, because they would be committing a criminal offence.

I think it is an OISC requirement that Liability Insurance be held.

ryanwins1983, do get a copy of the CAB's notes, as suggested by jimquk. What are they saying that they said?

CAB's are registered with OISC, therefore they must keep client notes and you must report them to OISC, who will get the client notes.

Did you explain the reason for the overstay? It may be worth asking for reconsideration on this.

Victoria

we are in the process of writing for reconsideration of the decision and also my wife has post natel depression and a symptom of this is that you concentrate on the small things i.e. cleaning the Spam and tend to forget the big issues, like being able to stay in the country. this is one of the reasons we are putting as to why she didn't question the advice given to her by the CAB. we are also in the process of speaking to the OISC regarding the CAB, however the CAB are very much adament that the advice they gave was correct, so i'm still not holding out much hope. we are also in talks with the local enforcement office RE returning to SA as we don't wnt my wife to be deported and then not able to get a visa from SA. so it's pretty much a long shot with the reconsideration and we're pretty resigned to the fact that my wife will not be in the country for a couple of months. but we're treating it like a holiday as apposed to anything else, for my wife to see her family etc otherwise it is far to depressing.

Is she being treated for the PND?

yes she is, however she went to see the CAB at around the time she was diagnosed with PND.

I asked for two reasons - firstly because I hoped she was being treated and on the mend, secondly it might well help explain what happened.