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Hello,

I am currently in the process of applying for settlement. I am from non EEA country but my wife is French. I have previously overstayed my UK visa for almost 15 years. I left volonrerily at the end of last year, but I came back recently having been granted entry clearance, EEA settlement family permit. My wife has been granted settled status.

As I said, I am now applying for my own status. I am aware that for settled status requirement is to be living in UK for five years, otherwise, one needs to apply for pre-settled status. Just a couple of questions:

1) Will time spent in UK illegally count towards this five years? During application process it says nothing about this. There is only mention that time spent in prison will not count. It simply asks the question whether I have been living in UK for five years, to which the answer is simply yes.

2) If I do apply for settled status and I get refused on the grounds that I haven't spent time legally here, will I be able to change the application to pre-settlement straight away, or I would have to re-apply, having to go through the whole process again, of booking biometrics appointment etc?

Many thanks for your help.

1) Will time spent in UK illegally count towards this five years? During application process it says nothing about this. There is only mention that time spent in prison will not count. It simply asks the question whether I have been living in UK for five years, to which the answer is simply yes

.
How long have you been married??

niki33 wrote: ↑

Fri Mar 06, 2020 12:08 pm

2) If I do apply for settled status and I get refused on the grounds that I haven't spent time legally here, will I be able to change the application to pre-settlement straight away, or I would have to re-apply, having to go through the whole process again, of booking biometrics appointment etc?

A very common misunderstanding of people considering to apply to the Settlement Scheme is to think that they need to choose which of Pre-Settled or Settled they need to apply to.

You do not "apply for Settled Status", you apply for the Settlement scheme, and the system decides, based on information they have on record and of further evidence you supply, which one of Pre-Settled or Settled they can give you.

So answer to your question is that if the system decides you do not qualify for Settled Status, it will simply grant you Pre-Settled status. No need to "change application to Pre-Settled" since there is no such a difference, since the application is the same for both; and no need to reapply.

CR001 wrote: ↑

Fri Mar 06, 2020 12:14 pm

1) Will time spent in UK illegally count towards this five years? During application process it says nothing about this. There is only mention that time spent in prison will not count. It simply asks the question whether I have been living in UK for five years, to which the answer is simply yes

.
How long have you been married??

Just a few months officially

niki33 wrote: ↑

Fri Mar 06, 2020 12:08 pm

As I said, I am now applying for my own status. I am aware that for settled status requirement is to be living in UK for five years, otherwise, one needs to apply for pre-settled status.

No. The requirement is (with rare exceptions) five years living in the UK with a connection to an EU national or equivalent, and connections require some form of official recognition to count.