Lost passport - degree certificate proof of continous stay?

Hi,
I have an issue with an application for ILR on the basis of 10 years in the UK as a student: I lost one of my passports I held during that time and I did a degree course during the entire time that passport was covering. Will it be sufficient proof of continous stay to show the degree certifcate I earned from the course? Unfortunately I don't have any other proofs of continous residence anymore but to have gotten the degree should prove that I must have been in the UK continously, will the home office follow that logic?

Get your SAR file which should show all your approved LTR's. I'm not sure that a degree certificate or attendance record alone would be sufficient to prove that you had LEGAL stay which is the key difference between 10 and 14-year concessions. Plus did you file a report with the police when your passport were lost? Otherwise it could raise suspicion in the caseworker's mind as to why you have not reported it.

As I said, your SAR file is probably your best chance at the moment. Get it asap as it can take a while and read through them when you receive yours and see if that covers the missing years.

Thanks for the quick answer!

In terms of LTR visa there's no problem really as the whole period the passport was covering was on a visa that was already issued on a passport that I still have posession of. And in terms of the information on landing cards (that would indeed be helpful) as part of SAR from what I read up to know nobody received all of them but rather none or only a few of them. Any other experience anyone?

What I'm more worried about is that in the documents listed in part 9S+T of the ILR SET(O) form as proof of continous residence there is no direct mention (could run only as "any other documents") of study related proofs of continous stay whereas they mention quite a few work related ones. I guess this is because work related ILR applications are far more common but I'm still worried that my degree certificate might not be sufficient and I don't have other documents from that long time ago anymore unfortunately. So anybody has an idea if there's still hope for the HO to accept this?

Please don't make duplicate posts on the same topic.


regards

I see that they have amended the wording of section 9S from the 2009 version to the 2010 one to include reference of section 9T. My best understanding is that if you could provide for the fact that you were indeed living in this country during the period concerned then it should be OK. If you were studying, could you not obtain confirmation of attendance from your institution? I would think that this is pretty hefty proof that you were living in this country. Otherwise I would think that bills, bank statements showing your financial activities (especially for the summer vacation periods) should be other ways of proving that you were living here and not absent.

W.r.t. landing cards, don't hold your breath. You don't necessarily get provided them even if you specifically ask for them in your letter of request, which is what happened in my case. I will PM you a copy of my SAR request letter if you want. As you have already noted, only a selection of people get supplied their landing cards. Whichever case yours is, I would say that it is still good practice to supply a spreadsheet of all your absences with your application, even though some are covered by your lost passport and you might only have a vague memory of (obviously make it clear in your application).

Unfortunately I have not come across anyone on here with much experience with this aspect of the new form so can't really advise that much. Maybe a more experienced user could tell more?