I hope this helps some of those waiting. I was approved quite quickly - I am thankful as I missed the Xmas Dec 15th or so cutoff before UKBA shut down for Xmas. They seem to be back to work now.
It's stressful dealing with government workers. The government worker themselves are the biggest part of the whole time consuming process, of course.
My first dealing with a UK government worker went like this:
1) arrived at the DVLA to change my German registration plates to British
2) Waited in the queue for 1/2 an hour
3) got to the front to be told I was supposed to go to the empty window to the right - not very clearly marked as the car import window ( and there was no worker at the window for the entire half hour )
4) the man who was responsible for importing cars was sitting at his desk the whole time - he now noticed he had a customer
5) the man picked up his newspaper that had been sitting on his desk and walked right past the window on the way to the toilet ( without saying anything )
6) about 15 minutes later he returned and came to the window to serve me "yes - what can I do for you - do you have a car to import?"
That pretty much set my expectations for British government workers and I remember the story everytime I need to do anything in this country involving a government worker. It sets my expectation quite low and, overall, reduces the stress and anxiety of waiting for the actual completion of the government worker's task ( as it's quite clear they may just have a task to take care of that is far more important to them than you are )!
