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I am a non-eea national married my husband who is an EEA national in June 2010 outside of the EU and we lived together outside of the UK for almost one year. I arrived in the UK on March 2012 and in April 2013 he filed for divorce which means we had been married for 2 years and 10 months. I took full time employment in Nov 2012 and am still fully employed until now and have never claimed any type of benefit. I received the 'Certificate of entitlement to a decree' on the 2nd January 2014 and have a fixed date of the 24th January 2014 for the pronouncement of a decree.

Married outside EU June 2010
Arrived UK March 2012
Residency Card Sept 2012 to Sept 2017
Husband initiated divorce proceedings April 2013
I have full time employment since November 2012 until now
I have never claimed any benefits

My questions are:

1) Although it stipulates that the marriage has to have been at least 3 years before my husband petitioned for divorce, I only fall short of this by 2 months, would this mean that I will be refused even though I can prove that I have full time employment and have never claimed any benefits and that my husband is willing to provide proof of exercising his treaty rights?

In order to satisfy the requirements of the Regulations, the non-EEA national must be living in the UK at the date of the divorce or annulment and should be:

Pursuing activity which would make him/her a worker or a self-employed person if s/he were an EEA national; or
A self-sufficient person; or
The family member of a person in the UK who is either a worker, self-employed, or is a self-sufficient person.

It is therefore possible for a non-EEA national to retain rights of residence should their marriage break down before their five year qualifying period for settlement, or permanent residency, has been completed. In cases where a marriage or partnership has lasted for less than three years, it may still be possible to retain residency rights if compelling reasons and evidence can be presented to the UKBA, however, retaining the right in these circumstances will clearly be much more difficult to achieve.
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1a) What would the compelling reasons be and do you think this would apply to me?

2) Another option would be for my husband to ask for the divorce to be cancelled but currently he is unwilling to do this and if he agreed to this, is this even possible at this stage?

3) Is there any way I can dispute the divorce at this late stage? I signed the documents agreeing to 'unreasonable behaviour' which I thought I was helping him to move on but I thought that the divorce would not affect my residency card.

4) I am with a new partner who is a British citizen, what if I were to marry him as soon as my divorce comes through(something we have spoken to do in the near future), would this then entitle me to stay in the Uk?

Thank you.

Spoken to someone from the UKBA European call centre and they said that the 3 years of marriage is from the date of marriage to when the divorce is finalised (when the decree of absolute). He said that there is no way of them knowing when the divorce was actually initiated and that the form only asks for the date of marriage and the date the divorce was finalised.

This is what the form asks:

4.2 Date of marriage:
4.3 Date the divorce/annulment/dissolution of civil partnership
was finalised
4.4 Have you been married for at least 3 years and lived in the UK for at least one of the three years?

So my question is, why are some people saying that it's when the divorce proceedings were initiated?

People working in the contact center always wrong . They are not case worker.

Please have a look at the EEA 2006 regulation

http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... iew=Binary

Regulation 10 ( 5 )

(5) A person satisfies the conditions in this paragraph if—
(a) he ceased to be a family member of a qualified person on the termination of the marriage or civil partnership of the qualified person;
(b) he was residing in the United Kingdom in accordance with these Regulations at the date of the termination;
(c) he satisfies the condition in paragraph (6); and
(d) either—
(i) prior to the initiation of the proceedings for the termination of the marriage or the civil partnership the marriage or civil partnership had lasted for at least three years and the parties to the marriage or civil partnership had resided in the United Kingdom for at least one year during its duration;

askmeplz82 wrote:People working in the contact center always wrong . They are not case worker.

Please have a look at the EEA 2006 regulation

http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... iew=Binary

Regulation 10 ( 5 )

(5) A person satisfies the conditions in this paragraph if—
(a) he ceased to be a family member of a qualified person on the termination of the marriage or civil partnership of the qualified person;
(b) he was residing in the United Kingdom in accordance with these Regulations at the date of the termination;
(c) he satisfies the condition in paragraph (6); and
(d) either—
(i) prior to the initiation of the proceedings for the termination of the marriage or the civil partnership the marriage or civil partnership had lasted for at least three years and the parties to the marriage or civil partnership had resided in the United Kingdom for at least one year during its duration;

They said that the document is wrong because it does not ask on the application form what date was the divorce initiated, but rather as to when was the divorce finalised. They also said that there is no way of them knowing as to when the divorce was initiated as the only document required is the 'Decree Absolute' and the date is not shown on this document as to when the petition was filed.

What do you make of all of that and how do you think they would find out the exact date as to when was the divorce initiated? Also, do you think it strange that the actual form asks for the finalisation date and not the initiation date?

On a side note, the petition was filed on April 2013 which meant we had been married 2 years 10 months, but then the petition was ammended on July 2013 which would mean we had been married 3 years 1 month. Would you think that the ammended date is the one that would be used for the divorce initiated?

vinny wrote:

10(5)(d) wrote:either—
(i)prior to the initiation of the proceedings for the termination of the marriage or the civil partnership the marriage or civil partnership had lasted for at least three years and the parties to the marriage or civil partnership had resided in the United Kingdom for at least one year during its duration;

So how do you suppose that they obtain the date that the divorce was initiated?

Take a look at the form Section 4 below.

http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... /eea21.pdf

Do you not think it strange that they're asking for the finalised date and not initiation date? I think that the initiation of proceedings means the date that the 'nisi' was issued which gives the go-ahead for the decree of absolute to be granted.

The only dates that are shown on a Decree Absolute are as follows:

Date and Place of Marriage
Date the Nisi was pronounced
Date Absolute was granted

It's strange and you may be lucky.

However, note that 10(5)(d)(i) is consistent with Article 13(2)(a) (34, 26).

vinny wrote:It's strange and you may be lucky.

However, note that 10(5)(d)(i) is consistent with Article 13(2)(a) (34, 26).

Just contacted the Family Magistrates Courts and they said that the HO never contacts them in regards to asking when the petition was filed and would not be interested in this date. All they are interested in is the Decree Absolute certificate which shows the marriage, nisi and finalised decree absolute date.

I think there is some real confusion regarding this and seems that the initiations of proceedings is the date that the nisi is granted ie, 6 weeks 1 day before the decree absolute can be obtained.

Please help me I am stressed out ...
Basically I came on student visa in 2010 and got married to eu national in October 2010,residence card granted 2011 valid untill 2016, in October 2013 had bit problem with my wife and filed divorced in October 2013 got decree NISI in December 2013 , but before one month mean in November 2013 we again started to live like husband wife and I had not apply decree of absulte now it's been almost 10 months and problems again started ...so thinking to apply decree of absolute my question is
My three year married life will be considered up to the decree of Nisi or from the initiated procedure of divorce?
Shall I withdraw the first divorce application and reaply again?
Shall I continue the pending case of divorce?
I am just bit confused please help me