I am a British National who is hoping to marry a boy who is on a Highly Skilled Migrant Visa. Two years ago he used the corrupt agency Univisa, who advised him to apply for the hsmp visa rather than a work permit extension.
Last year he met me, a British national and we decided to get married. We had our engagement in May 09 and wanted to have the civil court marriage in the U.K. For that to take place we needed to get a certificate of approval (COA). We submitted the COA application in July this year.
In August this year my fiancée found out about this corrupt agency he had used. It appears that the Univisa agency used his genuine documents to give other people false identities. He was given three options by the home office and he decided to opt for the option where he would prove that he was a genuine applicant.
The home office have several pieces of evidence against my fiancée as he signed the back copies of applications and left the corrupt agency to fill out the application. The home office also has letters which have false signatures of my fiancée.
We have not heard from the people who deal with COA, (it is now Nov), what can we do about this?
The home office set a court tribunal date in October this year to review the evidence against my fiancée but the barrister and solicitor dealing with the case were not prepared as they only received some of the paperwork from the home office three or four days before the hearing (also the barrister my fiancée explained everything to dropped out at the last minute and got his colleague who knew nothing of the case to step in on the day of the court hearing). The home office did not turn up for the hearing either (but according to the barrister this is normal). The barrister feels that if he can get a handwriting expert to testify that my fiancée had not signed some of the fake letters, then the home office will not have a case, and he will be allowed to continue to work here. Do you think we should be relying on this (handwriting expert testimony)? ]
My fiancée has submitted all his P60's and pay slips and letters from his employers. My mum was saying he should also get his landlord to testify that he has known him for 5 years and get copies from the council to say he paid council tax. Will this strengthen his case?
My fiancée has been speaking to a friend who works in Heathrow Airport in Immigration and he says that if my fiancée got his passport back he could go back to India with me and get married. He could then change his visa from HSMP to a SPOUSE VISA and bypass all this mess with getting a COA. Is this possible? In India will they not see that there is this big question over his immigration status or will it be straight forward? I am unsure if the computers in U.K which have his details about him being questioned about his immigration status (as he went through a corrupt agency) will flag up these problems in India when he applies for a spouse visa. Even if they do not , and he is granted a spouse visa from India, when he is entering into this country will the immigration people see that in the past he was on a work visa and he used the corrupt agency Univisa and that in the past there were unresolved questions around his previous immigration history in the U.K?
The home office have not written to us at all about what is happening with COA (it is well past the processing time of 14 weeks) so we have written to them again asking what is happening.
Final questions...:
My fiancée and I had to give our passports to the home office, however now his passport has expired (but it is locked up in a vault somewhere in the home office along with mine). In May 2010 his HSMP visa runs out. If this case is not cleared by then what will happen after May 2010?
If anyone has been in this situation we would really appreciate if you can get in touch with us as you may be able to give us further advise.
Thank-you.
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