Question - FLR(M) Application and 180 day limits

[EndCorp]

Hello,

I was wondering if I could ask a quick question and get some advice from someone who may have been through this process before.

My wife is a Chinese citizen and we successfully applied for leave to remain, FLR(M) for her in December 2017. We are now on the 5 year route to ILR and we are preparing for her next application for extended leave to remain in June this year (2020) (my question is not about Covid-19 restrictions).

Over the course of 2018 my wife's work took her on a lot of trips outside of the UK, and we also did some traveling together that year as well. This is because her employer was based abroad for an EU research project (this was the case when we made her first application in December 2017). She changed her job in 2018 and she does not need to travel as much now.

We have totted up all of her absent days from December 2017 to December 2018 and the total came to 187 days.

I know this has implications for applying for ILR (180 day limit), and apologies if this post is in the wrong place, but I have a couple of questions:

i) Can we still apply for FLR(M) (spouse route) at the end of June 2020? I think that the answer to this is 'yes', as we do meet the FLR(M) criteria and she is fully employed in the UK (I couldn't see anything regarding absent days for the FLR(M) application).

ii) What is the implication on this for ILR at the end of her second extension? I know the Home Office is getting strict with absent days, however personally I think the implication is that we would have to make another FLR(M) extension in the future (i.e. in December 2022 or so) until she has a 5 year continuous period.

Can anyone provide any advice? Please let me know if this is in the wrong topic area.

[CR001]

There is NO absence limit for spouse visa holders.

The 180 days limit applies to a completely different visa category!

[seagul]

We have totted up all of her absent days from December 2017 to December 2018 and the total came to 187 days.
:
.

Do you have cohabitation evidences addressed in joint/individual names during this period needs imperatively for extension??

[EndCorp]

We have totted up all of her absent days from December 2017 to December 2018 and the total came to 187 days.
:
.

Do you have cohabitation evidences addressed in joint/individual names during this period needs imperatively for extension??

Hello,

Thanks for sending through a reply.

Yes we do have this evidence - I think it would help if I just clarified something which I didn't make clear before. Before December 2017 my wife had joined me in the UK on a tiered visa (I can't remember which number but I think it was tier 5) and we were living together, had a lease in our joint names, joint bills, joint bank account statements, etc. We switched to FLR(M) whilst she was here and we continued living together. She had the same employer at this time, and we made this clear to the Home Office, however as mentioned before her work then required here to spend some time abroad. We talked every day whilst she was away and she regularly came back home to the UK during this time - we have evidence to this effect in the form of travel receipts and passport stamps.

[EndCorp]

There is NO absence limit for spouse visa holders.

The 180 days limit applies to a completely different visa category!

Thank you, that is a great reassurance.

[seagul]

We have totted up all of her absent days from December 2017 to December 2018 and the total came to 187 days.
:
.

Do you have cohabitation evidences addressed in joint/individual names during this period needs imperatively for extension??

Hello,

Thanks for sending through a reply.

Yes we do have this evidence - I think it would help if I just clarified something which I didn't make clear before. Before December 2017 my wife had joined me in the UK on a tiered visa (I can't remember which number but I think it was tier 5) and we were living together, had a lease in our joint names, joint bills, joint bank account statements, etc. We switched to FLR(M) whilst she was here and we continued living together. She had the same employer at this time, and we made this clear to the Home Office, however as mentioned before her work then required here to spend some time abroad. We talked every day whilst she was away and she regularly came back home to the UK during this time - we have evidence to this effect in the form of travel receipts and passport stamps.

If you have cohabitation evidences covering that gap then more likely there would be no issue.