My case wasn't straight forward as I had 156 days absence (up to 110 is acceptable I believe) in the preceding 365 days but only 347 days absence in the last 5 years (max allowed without the need for discretion: 450 days). I had quit my job to start my own consultancy and I decided to go on a month long travel sabbatical in July and return... the one month travel break became roughly 5 months where I bummed around the world but the intention was always to return to the UK (I popped by a couple of times for a week at a time).
I came back to London in January this year, applied for Naturalisation 7 days after my ILR anniversary and wrote a clear cover letter stating why I was absent and showed proof of strong ties to country & my genuine intention to live here. I did it by showing the registration of my consultancy company, its tax registration, my savings accounts, my private pension plus the long lease I had just signed for a flat. I was slightly worried as I was yet to be paid by clients for my work (billing cycles and all).
My immigration and tax history otherwise has been straightforward - 6 years of P60s, no overstay and I had made it a point of writing travel logs of all my days outside the UK since 2008 (when I first arrived as a student) plus saved photos of all receipts of bio-metrics given to Home Office, original letters of visa appointments and approvals - all this helped in creating a water tight application with exact dates available at hand.
I am very happy that all this paid off (10 years later) and despite having slightly more absences than acceptable, I have gotten through it all
Will be getting my ceremony date sorted soon. Good luck to everyone applying or waiting for decisions!
