Brazilian wife coming to UK to study

[Biscuits]

I´m a UK national in Brazil at the moment to get married to a Brazilian girl who I met in the UK. She has been accepted to a University in London to do a Masters degree, starting in October. I´m supposing that in theory that gives us two options for her visa; study or spouse.

Her course was only offered to her (rather late) after we had arranged to come to Brazil. It´s still a provisional offer and there is a small chance that her funding won´t come through, so then we would have to apply for a spouse visa. The problem is that whilst we were dating she had been overstaying on a tourist visa. I´m not wanting to spin a web of deception when it comes to the interview; how black a mark is it if it comes out that she has overstayed?

[vinny]

Student applicants may be refused for a limited period, depending on previous length of overstay, unless they left the UK between 17 March 2008 and 1 October 2008. However, spouses are normally exempt from automatic refusal, subject to 320(11). Don't attempt deception.

[Biscuits]

Thanks for the advice, very helpful. Sorry to ask about stuff which has been published but the various gov visa websites I found to be difficult to navigate. We shall applying for a spouse visa so any further queries I´ll post in the other forum.