Help needed - Spouse visa refused Brazil/UK

Hi everyone, I'm applying for a spouse visa (BR) through my partner (UK) in Brazil.

tl;dr gross error from officer, anyone has seen this happen before or knows how appeals work in this case?

I have received lots of good advice here during my application but we have hit an unforeseen issue that I researched here and couldn't see a similar situation.

Both my partner and I are currently in Brazil and have lived in Brazil here February 2019. We have been married since April 2018 (3+ years) and cohabitating for longer than we've been married.

My partner is my sponsor and works in Brazil for more than 12 months with the same employer. We wrote a cover letter and provided employment letter explaining how his salary is paid (13 installments + bonus) and the cash savings we would need to use: one UK ISA account and the minimum balance in his Brazilian account, which would cover all of the requirements.

However, the officer:

• ignored key documentation sent (we sent Brazilian and full translated payslips for the whole period and the letter of employment that they mention as missing);

• used the wrong conversion rate according to the guidance (June 4th instead of April 22nd, when the application was made);

• ignored the Brazilian savings account completely;

• did the salary calculation wrong (did not account for 13 installments and bonus);

• did not contact us to request any missing documentation.

I am truly disappointed and shocked at the lack of attention to such an important and expensive matter.

We have contacted a lawyer to appeal. Have you all heard about such mistakes before? What do you think about an appeal in this case - how long do they take, are officers and judges reasonable on the appeal process?

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Please see excerpt from refusal letter below:

You state on your application you will meet the financial requirements with a combination of salaried employment and cash savings.

Your sponsor is not exempt from the financial requirements as defined paragraph E-ECP.3.3. I am not able to take into account any potential employment you have available to you in the UK or any offers of financial support from third parties.

In regards to the salaried employment, you state on the application your sponsor earns less than required amount of £18,600 and earns £15,393 per annum currently. However, from the wage slips provided, our calculations determine your sponsor earns BRL 7,894.34 (£1,099.08) gross per month, which is £13,188.96 per annum.

I note you have not provided a letter from your employer detailing the requirements stated above and the most recent pay slip submitted, is dated December 2020, over four months prior to your application date. As you state you are currently employed by the company, the pay slips you have provided are not sufficient. Therefore, given the above, I am not satisfied you have submitted the required documents.

In regards to your cash savings, you have submitted a bank statement in your sponsors name for a Flexclusive ISA account number [xxx], with a balance of £[xxx] on 17/04/2021. I acknowledge and am satisfied they have been held for six months as the statement notes statement period as 17/04/2020 – 17/04/2021. However, I am not satisfied that you meet the financial requirement, as the amount you are required to evidence in savings has not been met, as demonstrated below;

£18,600 - £13,188 = £5,412, £5,412 x 2.5 + £16,000 = £29,530 (savings required).

I therefore refuse your application under paragraph EC-P.1.1 (d) of Appendix FM of the Immigration Rules. (E-ECP.3.1)

Forgot to add:
My parter has also secured a job offer in the UK and we provided the offer letter and contract which both state he will be starting in August 2021 and earning above the financial requirements.

gelidusgaudium wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 11, 2021 3:24 pm

Hi everyone, I'm applying for a spouse visa (BR) through my partner (UK) in Brazil.

tl;dr gross error from officer, anyone has seen this happen before or knows how appeals work in this case?

I have received lots of good advice here during my application but we have hit an unforeseen issue that I researched here and couldn't see a similar situation.

Both my partner and I are currently in Brazil and have lived in Brazil here February 2019. We have been married since April 2018 (3+ years) and cohabitating for longer than we've been married.

My partner is my sponsor and works in Brazil for more than 12 months with the same employer. We wrote a cover letter and provided employment letter explaining how his salary is paid (13 installments + bonus) and the cash savings we would need to use: one UK ISA account and the minimum balance in his Brazilian account, which would cover all of the requirements.

However, the officer:

• ignored key documentation sent (we sent Brazilian and full translated payslips for the whole period and the letter of employment that they mention as missing);

• used the wrong conversion rate according to the guidance (June 4th instead of April 22nd, when the application was made);

• ignored the Brazilian savings account completely;

• did the salary calculation wrong (did not account for 13 installments and bonus);

• did not contact us to request any missing documentation.

I am truly disappointed and shocked at the lack of attention to such an important and expensive matter.

We have contacted a lawyer to appeal. Have you all heard about such mistakes before? What do you think about an appeal in this case - how long do they take, are officers and judges reasonable on the appeal process?

-----

Please see excerpt from refusal letter below:

You state on your application you will meet the financial requirements with a combination of salaried employment and cash savings.

Your sponsor is not exempt from the financial requirements as defined paragraph E-ECP.3.3. I am not able to take into account any potential employment you have available to you in the UK or any offers of financial support from third parties.

In regards to the salaried employment, you state on the application your sponsor earns less than required amount of £18,600 and earns £15,393 per annum currently. However, from the wage slips provided, our calculations determine your sponsor earns BRL 7,894.34 (£1,099.08) gross per month, which is £13,188.96 per annum.

I note you have not provided a letter from your employer detailing the requirements stated above and the most recent pay slip submitted, is dated December 2020, over four months prior to your application date. As you state you are currently employed by the company, the pay slips you have provided are not sufficient. Therefore, given the above, I am not satisfied you have submitted the required documents.

In regards to your cash savings, you have submitted a bank statement in your sponsors name for a Flexclusive ISA account number [xxx], with a balance of £[xxx] on 17/04/2021. I acknowledge and am satisfied they have been held for six months as the statement notes statement period as 17/04/2020 – 17/04/2021. However, I am not satisfied that you meet the financial requirement, as the amount you are required to evidence in savings has not been met, as demonstrated below;

£18,600 - £13,188 = £5,412, £5,412 x 2.5 + £16,000 = £29,530 (savings required).

I therefore refuse your application under paragraph EC-P.1.1 (d) of Appendix FM of the Immigration Rules. (E-ECP.3.1)

The caseworker has failed to exercise evidence flexibility as per appendix FM-SE to request for certain documents which are needed to make a decision on the application.


I would get your MP involve as as soon as possible by writing an email to your sponsor local MP to help you contact the UKVI to review the decision again and explained in a well covered email.

If you think the caseworker made an error, you can appeal the decision but bear in mind that, appealing a decision is a long process and can take up to a year or more.

Oh wow, we had not thought of contacting the MP. We have done so today.
Thanks a lot for the help.

I'll add any new developments here in case it helps others.

as @TODMATT pointed out appealing the refusal could be a lengthy process and also expensive if you involve a solicitor. Also, success of the appeal is not guaranteed. Another and a more expedient option would be to re-apply once you made sure that you understand the rules and comply with the requirements, also taking account of the ECO's reasons for the refusal.

In particular:
1
You refer to an "employment letter" Was this a letter from the employer who issued the payslips confirming your partner's employment and gross annual salary, the length of this employment, the period over which he was paid the level of salary relied upon in the application and the type of employment (permanent, fixed-term contract, etc)?
2
Payslips have to be submitted for a 6 month period immediately preceding the date of application. You applied on 22 April and it seems that you only submitted 2 or 3 of the 6 required.
3
For the Brazilian savings account you need to submit statements confirming that the amount relied on has been held for at least for 6 months prior to the application date.
4.
The exchange rate for the conversion of foreign currency to pounds sterling is the closing spot exchange rate which appears on www.oanda.com on the date of the online application. Looking at the Oanda website the ECO's conversion seems to be correct as of 22 April.
5
You would need confirmation in the employer's letter that the 13th month salary payment and the bonus are guaranteed.
6
The ECO calculated that you needed £29,530 cash savings at the time of your application. This should be the sum of the Brazilian savings and the UK ISA. The exchange rate may of course be different when you re-apply but by how much did you fall short of this amount at the time?
7
The references for the rules are:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.u ... .0-ext.pdf
and
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/immigration ... d-evidence

Hi, thanks for the reply.
We reviewed all the rules in detail prior to the application. I am currently awaiting for VFS to submit a proof of the documents uploaded to understand if there was an error on their end.

1
You refer to an "employment letter" Was this a letter from the employer who issued the payslips confirming your partner's employment and gross annual salary, the length of this employment, the period over which he was paid the level of salary relied upon in the application and the type of employment (permanent, fixed-term contract, etc)?

Yes, we reviewed the guidance and submitted this letter from his employer with the application. The letter included all the points mentioned and the amount of his bonus payment - which was not considered by the ECO.

2
Payslips have to be submitted for a 6 month period immediately preceding the date of application. You applied on 22 April and it seems that you only submitted 2 or 3 of the 6 required.

We provided 12 months of payslips up until March 2021.

3
For the Brazilian savings account you need to submit statements confirming that the amount relied on has been held for at least for 6 months prior to the application date.

Also provided 12 months of statements up to March 2021.

4.
The exchange rate for the conversion of foreign currency to pounds sterling is the closing spot exchange rate which appears on www.oanda.com on the date of the online application. Looking at the Oanda website the ECO's conversion seems to be correct as of 22 April.

No, the exchange rate was calculated incorrectly. They calculated his salary as BRL 7,894.34 = £1,099.08, instead of the correct amount of £1,017.18
The ECO's conversion was more beneficial to us, but since they didn't consider the bonus we still fell short as per his/hers calculations.

5
You would need confirmation in the employer's letter that the 13th month salary payment and the bonus are guaranteed.

This was included in employment letter which mentioned his gross salary was 26 installments and bonus salary (all which had been paid prior to the application and included in payslips and bank statements).

6
The ECO calculated that you needed £29,530 cash savings at the time of your application. This should be the sum of the Brazilian savings and the UK ISA. The exchange rate may of course be different when you re-apply but by how much did you fall short of this amount at the time?

The ECO did not take into account the bonus, 13th salary and Brazilian savings which means we would fall short. At the time, if they had done the calculations properly we would have cash savings required of 24015.09 and our savings were of 25289.40, so we would be clearly above the financial requirements - considering April 22nd's exchange rate.

To proceed with the appeal It is important that you comply with the timelines given in the refusal letter. and to use the correct appeal form. Explain in detail why you think the ECO's decision was wrong, e.g. that you submitted the employer's letter, the Jan-March payslips and evidence of the cash savings in Brazil but the ECO claimed that you had not.

You'll find some useful information on the website third party lawyer Web link removed by moderator. Please only post official links.
In particular about the procedure:

When the Entry Clearance Post receives an appeal, an Entry Clearance Manager (ECM) will review the refusal of the original application in conjunction with the grounds of appeal and the documents submitted with the appeal form. They will make a decision to either uphold the original decision or overturn the decision and grant leave to enter to the appellant. The entry clearance appeal process therefore stops when the appeal is favourably reviewed and the original decision is overturned.