HSMP - refused on salary - review advice needed

I just got my HSMP decision and it is a refusal.

I claimed 40 points for earnings of £16,200 in Spain where I am currently working on a visa and got rejected as 3 of my payslips were not accepted and thus I only got 15 points (which again seems weird as the amount on those payslips doesn't add up to the difference they deducted to get to their new figure). THe worst part is that I got paid double wages in December and that is one of the months that they are not accepting.

The issue seems to be that 3 of the payslips were printouts due to the company losing 3 payslips in the post. So I got printouts that are officially stamped and signed (as this is what I was told would be acceptable).

In addition to this I submitted bank statements and a letter from the employer on official company paper stating my income. So I submit 3 pieces of evidence and they only look at 2. I also sent a spreadsheet explaining how I arrived at the total with some text explaining where it might not be clear. It seems the more you try to help the more a hinderance it is.

I will request a review as it seems crazy that this decision has been made, but I'd like some advice if anyone out there has been through this process before with regards to this kind of situation.

I have since left the company so I don't know if anyone has phone the contact to verify my income, although if they had and something had gone wrong they would have put it in the rejection letter don't you think? If they did then what if the person doesn't speak good english? Is that a straight non-verified case? That seems crazy to me as well.

Is it worth employing a lawyer rather than just sending the review request document and letter? I'm nervous now that if i do this on my own they will reject that as a lawyer who deals with this on a daily basis will know how to put the case across best. Also can i get a lawyer to do this even though i didn't go through one when i initially applied?

Any advice would be most helpful.

Was it the 3 payslips that was printed out that was rejected, or another three?

Why were u paid twice in december, and did you explain this to them ?

I think you have a good case for review. Can you clear up a couple of things that might help us understand your situation:

1) Did you fill in the "Exceptional Consideration" box?
2) For each deposit on your bank statements what does it say?
Something like :"SALARY/ABC COMPANY, INC" "XXXX.XX"
or
Something like "DEPOSIT/WAGES" "XXXX.XX"

2) What was the EXACT wording in your refusal letter.

I have seen a lot of people get their case accepted on review.

I will post the exact refusal letter later, but in answer to a few questions:

Yes it was the payslips that were printed (and stamped and signed with the official company stamp) that were not acceptable.

When i say i got paid twice in December what i mean is that i got paid twice my monthly wages. It is just the way the company structures how you get paid throughout the year, for Christmas i guess.

I did fill in the exceptional circumstances box as i didn't have a payslip for the period claiming.

On the bank statements it states that the money was paid in by the company and not just wages.

Thanks for your comment about seeing a lot of people get accepted on review. I was quite down after getting the letter, but now i'm more hopeful that I can get the decision overturned on review.

You said: "I did fill in the exceptional circumstances box as i didn't have a payslip for the period claiming."

I think you wanted to say that you did not have Tax Clearance?

The HO really needs tax clearance even if it doesn't cover the entire period claimed. If it is the TC that u did not submit with the application they may be wondering why u didn't submit it. that is my only fear.

Post the entire letter when u can and c what advise the forum can come up with

Ah, yes. If you didn't submit any tax document at all and then didn't list why you didn't include a tax return then you would be denied straight away.

Yes you are right it was the tax return form that i didn't have. It was explained that it wasn't submitted, not even partially because the period claimed for was Jan 2006-Jan 2007 and the tax year in Spain runs Jan-Dec, but you can only get a tax return in May at the earliest so i couldn't get a tax return for any of the time claimed for. This all went on the form and exceptional circumstances were claimed for and this was explained in the evidence submitted.

This isn't mentioned in the refusal letter so I don't think this was the issue.

I will post the letter tomorrow as i've not had time to write it up.

Thanks for your comments though. It is all much appreciated.

Interesting. I have read posts similar to this before, and it seems that people got letters from tax authorities stating that tax returns were not available.