Court of Appeal Ruling - COA infringes human rights

The Court of Appeal has ruled that the COA process infringes on human rights as it effectively labels the marriage process thereof as potentially sham without any conclusive proof of such. I expect the Home Office to either scrap the COA scheme or implement it for all marriages no later than the 3rd quarter of 2007. If the former the lost revenue will act as an incentive to increase fees across the board even higher than I initially expect in the 1st quarter of 2008 pursuant to the commencement of the new points scheme.

Kayalami, great to see your post. I hope you are well.

I keep looking on the BIA website but as yet there is no official reaction or revised plans or rules relating to CoAs. But they cannot simply ignore the judgement so something must appear sometime.

The comment at the moment must be ... don't apply now for a CoA .... until the revised BIA position becomes clear.

Nice to have you back - Kaya

See also War on bogus immigrants' sham marriages 'is a breach of human rights' and Judgments - R (On The Application of Baiai and Others) V Secretary of State For The Home Department

Vinny

U contribute enormously in regard to current law and I commend ur Legal Research skills.

Any update on "Certificate of Approval for Marriage" requiremt's affect on overtstrayer/illegal Non EEA member who want to maary a EEA qualified person.? As the threat of deportation proceedins is continue on Home Office's website.

COAs are now free.

Thank you Vinny, it is a good devlopment.

There is wait when HO will take into account full judgement of Baiai, for example, Church of England still having privilidge.

is it possible to apply for COA while my passport is with home office for psw

Does anyone know if there has been a decision made by the Home Office regarding those who have already paid for a COA (Feb 2008 in our case) and might be entitled to a refund?

Hi Jim,

Check http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... efund-form

Thanks for that - hadn't seen that.

Sadly it doesnt help me - I don't qualify as I didnt suffer 'exceptional hardship'.

Still had to fork out 300 quid I couldn't really afford, what with a wedding to pay for.

Robbing bar-stewards...

HO are smartish, I luv them. Who can technically apply for a refund- noone cause everyone was either on student, work or other visas which require one to be self sufficient, I really luv the HOs they r the real HOs sneaky little fcukers hahaha

Well, if it's any consolation once I'm done with the JR process that I'm in, I'll apply for this even though I cannot prove "exceptional hardship" and if they refuse I'm mounting a civil claim against them in the same way you'd do for bank charges

hey ginoT,
i'm in the same boat. selfsufficient, no financial hardship. but duh, 300 is not nothing. so i was thinking to apply anyway.
did you apply already? got your money back? our COA was also 2 weeks delayed and we sent email complaint to ho before receiving it.
does anyone know if this would count as some sort of reason to why they should refund the fee???

I haven't applied just yet. The reason is I'm taking the HO to a JR and my barrister (a top London barrister working at Cherie Booth's law firm) has recently confirmed the COA scheme is unlawful in light of the Balai ruling and was especially so in requesting moneys from me. This is going to form part of my JR. I'll confirm more as soon as I can.

What I will advice anyone planning to marry is not to waste time applying for COA again,particularly if you still have some minus against your immigration status.....Its easier and better if you just go through the church of england route..the worst required of you is a licence which you get for £75 and its posted first class to you....so you'll get it next day after seeing the registrar...the good thing is your marriage entitles you to a green style marriage certificate which is the same as what you'll get from the registry...it amazes me that if you even ring the registry after some weeks of your wedding in the church of england they hold a register of your wedding already...this is always passed to the same registry you are applying to the home office to get marriage approval.....if you insist on registry,you can arrange after your marriage in COE to renew your vows in the registry rather than going through stress and delays with HO....................CAPOOT.

Good luck getting the COA fee refunded...

They will not refund anyone who had a visa that required them to be self-sufficient/self-supporting.

Despite more than meeting the financial hardship criteria, our refund was denied, as my wife was on a student visa when she applied for the COA, thus is automatically deemed as being self-suffient, therefore expected to pay the fee.

That is so unfair. Both my wife and i were on a student visa and had to pay 295 each.

I understand that students are legally required to provide for themselves, but paying an unecessary fee for an unecessary piece of paper is not providing for yourself!

I'm required to have enough for my school fees, and for every day life. Paying 300 just to get a permission to get married because i'm foreign does definitely not fall into that category! Makes me so angry, they've made so much money on us.

£820/£1020 for an Indefinite Leave to Remain visa makes me more angry...

Especially as it was free before 2003!

phicus wrote:That is so unfair. Both my wife and i were on a student visa and had to pay 295 each.

I understand that students are legally required to provide for themselves, but paying an unecessary fee for an unecessary piece of paper is not providing for yourself!

I'm required to have enough for my school fees, and for every day life. Paying 300 just to get a permission to get married because i'm foreign does definitely not fall into that category! Makes me so angry, they've made so much money on us.

As a student I totally get where you're coming from. Any money to a student is a lot of money(especially considering the amount of international tuition fees we pay), even though we are technically self sufficient. When I got married however, I had no desire to get married in the uk (too cold, can't have a beach weddin, too many restrictions) so we got married in my dream place in the caribean instead .

Yeah, that is a nice wedding Sadly, the UK was all we could afford, and since she's from the states and i'm from Serbia, England was 'middle ground' for both families to be able to attend.

I think i'll start playing the lottery. There's more chance of me getting any money from there than getting the COA refund here!

Yeah, junkymotown, i've got a friend who's going through that, and is quite upset. He needs to pay them £1000, and it's virtually impossible to book an application. The service is 'here' but is almost unusable! What's the £1000 for then? They should be kissing your rear for that amount of money!

phicus wrote:Yeah, that is a nice wedding Sadly, the UK was all we could afford, and since she's from the states and i'm from Serbia, England was 'middle ground' for both families to be able to attend.

I think i'll start playing the lottery. There's more chance of me getting any money from there than getting the COA refund here!

Yeah, junkymotown, i've got a friend who's going through that, and is quite upset. He needs to pay them £1000, and it's virtually impossible to book an application. The service is 'here' but is almost unusable! What's the £1000 for then? They should be kissing your rear for that amount of money!

To be honest, when we calculated the costs, it was cheaper to have it at the carribean.

hehe I've tried the lottery several times. It's fun just for the sake of the suspense. I know some people that seriously go mad playing the lottery. It's almost become like a job they have to do every weds+saturday. They do not just try the english one but the irish and some other country's one as well.

Haha, i was being sarcastic about the lottery, i never played it and never will...it's a waste of money

phicus wrote:Haha, i was being sarcastic about the lottery, i never played it and never will...it's a waste of money

Never ever?!

junkymotown wrote:£820/£1020 for an Indefinite Leave to Remain visa makes me more angry...

Especially as it was free before 2003!

1020 is alot. All credits to Tony & Co ( labour party ).