Extending Grandmother's stay

Dear members of this forum,

I would like some advice on the case of my grandmother. She is 80 years old and came to England as a tourist a few months ago on a 6 month visa. She has been here several times before, staying 3+ months at any one time. The problem is that her own family cannot look after her anymore so my mother wanted to look into extending her stay here - temporarily or permanently.

We have our own house and are currently paying a mortgage for this, we do not claim any benefits and both my parents work. What course of action must we take to ensure she has a chance of having her stay here extended?

I look forward to hearing from you!

General visitor.
Family visitor.

Also see Adult Dependent Relatives

Entry Clearance as an Adult Dependent Relatives

You should take urgent legal advice before you make any applications for her to remain in the UK. There are no extensions permittted for visitors under the conditions you have described. It's very difficult to bring elderly dependant relatives to the UK, and even if they are old and not able to perform basic tasks, the immigration rules require that you pay for a nurse or home-help in her country rather than bring them to the UK. It's clear that you can afford such person (assuming the salary for that type of work is very low in her country) so any application you make will be refused. What this means is that any new visit visa applications will also be refused because that is what happens to visit applications subsequent to failed settlement applications.

Thank you all for your posts, her original visa is for 6 months so I guess I will require legal advice. We have booked an appointment to see somebody next week.

Thank you all again!

To give you an idea on the difficultly, I believe that official statistics show there were only 4 successful elderly dependent visa applications in 2013.

Be careful who you talk to. Frankly, if anyone tells that it's possible you should take a second opinion because, as stated, she will never get another visit visa if she is refused a settlement leave to remain made inside the UK as a visitor. There would need to have been a sudden, drastic and unforeseeable change to her situation while visiting the UK, for an application made inside the UK to be accepted - and that is for qualified applicant and without even addressing the issue you are facing of being easily able to provide care for her remotely, by sending money for carers.

Lucapooka wrote:Be careful who you talk to. Frankly, if anyone tells that it's possible you should take a second opinion because, as stated, she will never get another visit visa if she is refused a settlement leave to remain made inside the UK as a visitor. There would need to have been a sudden, drastic and unforeseeable change to her situation while visiting the UK, for an application made inside the UK to be accepted - and that is for qualified applicant and without even addressing the issue you are facing of being easily able to provide care for her remotely, by sending money for carers.

Oh dear, I am really worried now. To be honest it isn't that the family she has in her home country cannot look after her - it is that they don't want to anymore. She was already heart-broken for the way she was treated back there, I don't know how she'll take going back (her 3 daughters are here). Care Homes are also something very new to her home country and thus nowhere near the standard we have here. Then again if she stayed here she would stay at our place, not in care.

I really hope there is a solution to all of this.

Casa wrote:To give you an idea on the difficultly, I believe that official statistics show there were only 4 successful elderly dependent visa applications in 2013.

Wow, only 4! :O

The fact that she has close family there (even though they are reluctant to help) makes the application even tougher. Your only option (apart from moving to take care of in her home country) would be for you all to relocate to another EU state, take up employment and prove that you have 'moved the centre of your life there' for at least 6 months and then return to the UK under the 'Surinder Singh' route. This however has become more difficult with the rules tightened.