Tier 4 visa application/working hours

Hi, I am a PhD student. I transferred my institution in the second month which meant I had to apply for another visa. Between the time I left my old institution and when I resumed at my new institution which is about a month, I worked beyond the 20 hours as I did not know it was illegal to work at all. I have paid my tuition in full as I am on a scholarship but my funding(living expenses and tuition) just arrived in February which meant I had to find money to pay for my new visa application and survive till then. I was almost homeless at some point. Please, will this affect my new application? I have just attended my interview and it went okay but I am very worried. am from Nigeria and I was already on the new course as I am allowed to register once I had applied. I would also want to know if they always check working hours when you apply.Thanks

if they notice it from your bank statement unusual amount of money coming in from a company as your payment, they will inquire about it.
if they check your NI or even ask your employer to disclose information about your working hours. you will be in trouble because you were clearly in breach of the immigration rules when you were working more than 20 hours.
not only you but your employer will also be in trouble and possibly fined for it.

when you get your bio metric residenc permit. it says to read the remarks clearly and follow them. also, it clearly explains the Remarks which are there. for example 20 hours max during term time which must be followed at all times.

aaliya1986 wrote:if they notice it from your bank statement unusual amount of money coming in from a company as your payment, they will inquire about it.
if they check your NI or even ask your employer to disclose information about your working hours. you will be in trouble because you were clearly in breach of the immigration rules when you were working more than 20 hours.
not only you but your employer will also be in trouble and possibly fined for it.

when you get your bio metric residenc permit. it says to read the remarks clearly and follow them. also, it clearly explains the Remarks which are there. for example 20 hours max during term time which must be followed at all times.

Many thanks for your response. I made a terrible mistake and i feel very bad now. But I am unsure how often they will check a bank statement though or is it 100 percent of the times with applications that are not from low-risk countries?

Also the working hours provision is not supposed fund your studies.

If it was a few extra hours you might be ok, if it was full time plus.......

Wanderer wrote:Also the working hours provision is not supposed fund your studies.

Where are you getting that information?

sah10406 wrote:

Wanderer wrote:Also the working hours provision is not supposed fund your studies.

Where are you getting that information?

10 years on these forums....

You should tear yourself away from the forums and look at the immigration rules.

The pre-Tier 4 student immigration rules said you must have enough money without needing to work. This was dropped nearly 6 years ago when Tier 4 came in.

Appendix C, para 1A(d) says that in an immigration application you cannot use money that was earned from working illegally, but there is no general prohibition on using earnings.

Hello Ibadan
I noticed you changed your university inside the UK, could you help with my question please.
My younger brother is presently studying in a university in London and wishes to switch to 2nd year in another University in UK. I believe he has to make another application and was going through the requirements. Correct me if I am wrong, since he has already completed or is in the process of completing a year, he qualifies as someone with an established presence? Has any one who has been in this process kindly explain what they had to do? Did they have to pay complete full fees in the new school get a CAS and do the application. If you have any experience, will appreciate your post here. Thanks

IJOS wrote:Hello Ibadan
I noticed you changed your university inside the UK, could you help with my question please.
My younger brother is presently studying in a university in London and wishes to switch to 2nd year in another University in UK. I believe he has to make another application and was going through the requirements. Correct me if I am wrong, since he has already completed or is in the process of completing a year, he qualifies as someone with an established presence? Has any one who has been in this process kindly explain what they had to do? Did they have to pay complete full fees in the new school get a CAS and do the application. If you have any experience, will appreciate your post here. Thanks

Hi IJOS, I transferred my PhD in the 2nd month and since I am a sponsored student, I did not pay a penny as my sponsors were yet to pay and I used a sponsorship letter. Also, I had informed them after the first month that I was leaving. For your brother's case, I would assume he has completed a year already which should qualify him for established presence but I am not totally sure. What he can do is contact the Dean of Students at his new institution as they will be very willing to help (they really helped me). For his new uni, he may have to pay a certain percentage to get a CAS first but I am not sure if the Home Office will require him to show certain amount of funds in his account again for the leave to remain application. However, I would doubt if he would need to have the same living expenses as someone who is just applying. Just get the right info from the DoS of the institution as they deal with issues like this on a fairly regular basis.

Many thanks to everyone that offered one form of advice or the other. My visa has just been granted and my BRP issued. I now have a leave to remain in the UK till the end of my course in 2018. It actually appeared that PhD students have full working permission during Christmas and Easter breaks except summer break as they should be writing their thesis. With this then my work during Christmas and New Year wasn't illegal. I will get a permission letter from my uni next time so I can be doubly covered. Good luck with your applications and don't hesitate to hit me up if you have any issues or questions relating to what I passed through.

ibadan wrote:Many thanks to everyone that offered one form of advice or the other. My visa has just been granted and my BRP issued. I now have a leave to remain in the UK till the end of my course in 2018. It actually appeared that PhD students have full working permission during Christmas and Easter breaks except summer break as they should be writing their thesis. With this then my work during Christmas and New Year wasn't illegal. I will get a permission letter from my uni next time so I can be doubly covered. Good luck with your applications and don't hesitate to hit me up if you have any issues or questions relating to what I passed through.

H

Thanks Ibadan for your response.

We will do that

ibadan wrote:Many thanks to everyone that offered one form of advice or the other. My visa has just been granted and my BRP issued. I now have a leave to remain in the UK till the end of my course in 2018. It actually appeared that PhD students have full working permission during Christmas and Easter breaks except summer break as they should be writing their thesis. With this then my work during Christmas and New Year wasn't illegal. I will get a permission letter from my uni next time so I can be doubly covered. Good luck with your applications and don't hesitate to hit me up if you have any issues or questions relating to what I passed through.

Who told you this? In most cases Phd students are not normally allowed to work full time during vacations as standard university term dates don't apply to them, they are supposed to be working full time on their thesis, although it does depend on the university concerned as they will define when you are on vacation, however in your case as you'd left your previous institution (and were not at the end of the course) you should not have been working at all as you were not enrolled on a course of study.