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Hi all!

Need some clarity from the gurus please, regarding retention of EEA permit.

Non- EEA Married EEA national : Oct 2003
EEA permit: Jan 2004, expired in 2006
2 EEA National Children during marriage
Spent lots of time in other EEA countries and UK due to EEA national's job between 2006 -2009

Reapplied and obtained for EEA permit Oct 2009 valid until 2014
EEA filed for divorce in his home country Feb 2010, divorce grated Feb 2010 (very quick on mutual agreement)
Sole custody of kids given to Non-EEA national.
Both kids are in school in UK since Sept. 2009
Non- EEA is currently job seeking but is also self-employed but income from this job is very low.
Non-EEA has family in the UK.

Hope all is clear enough. I would please like to know what documents I need to notify the HO. They have told me on 2 occasions I should write a letter.

Thank you in advance for the help!!!:-)

beehive wrote:Spent lots of time in other EEA countries and UK due to EEA national's job between 2006 -2009

This is the first problem: you have to check whether this breaks your continuous residence. If not, you already received PR status in 2008, and you should be fine. I am not sure about the exact rules, but absences above 3 months may be a problem.

If you residence is broken, you need to apply for retention of residence, and that will be tricky if your EEA ex is not longer in the UK.

Another option is to get your residence based on the rights of the kids, assuming at least one is in school now.

I don't think I can apply for PR now due to break in residence.

My children are in school, so I could use that. My EEA ex has indefinite leave, will that make any different? He's also from one of the old EU countries.