FLR(M) - Evidence for Self-Employment Income

[RandomOfAmber]

Hello all,

I have an appointment in Croydon on Monday to put in my FLR(M) Partner visa application in person at the PEO, and could *urgently* use some help in answering a few niggling questions regarding evidence for meeting the financial requirement.

I intend to use my UK partner's income from self-employment in the last full financial year (route F) to evidence the financial requirement. He is a self-employed marketing consultant (sole trader) who does short- to longer-term contracted jobs, and in the past full financial year took in £29,999 gross from his consultancy contracts. All of his contracts pay full expenses (phone, travel, etc.) so he has no expenses (per se) to register. However, I have several questions about how we can go about providing the correct evidence to meet the financial requirements as outlined in Appendix FM-SE.

Q1. "7 (a) Evidence of the amount of tax payable, paid and unpaid for the last full financial year." What do they mean by 'evidence' here? Are they looking for anything in particular?

Q2. 7b asks for annual self-assessment tax return to HMRC AND an SA300. However, the last full financial year has only JUST ended two days ago, and he is not required to file a tax return, or pay self-assessment tax, until Jan 2015. For purposes of this application does he need to file a 2013/14 tax return NOW? If so, will a printed version of the online SA300 be sufficient to meet UKBA's evidentiary requirement here?

Q3. "7 (g) Evidence of ongoing self-employment through evidence of payment of Class 2 National Insurance contributions." Again, what evidence are they after, here? These days these payments are all made online, and HMRC is too useless to provide receipts.

But 7h is where things really get messy.

Q4. "7 (h) One of the following documents must also be submitted: (i) (aa) If the business is required to produce annual audited accounts, such accounts for the last full financial year; or (bb) If the business is not required to produce annual audited accounts, unaudited accounts for the last full financial year and an accountant‟s certificate of confirmation, from an accountant who is a member of a UK Recognised Supervisory Body (as defined in the Companies Act 2006)."

My partner is not, in himself, a 'business', and does not make it his regular daily task to keep 'accounts' of any particular order. He works, and he files his tax returns, and he pays his tax. How, then, is he to meet this evidentiary requirement? He obviously isn't required to produce audited accounts, so presumably 7(h)(i)(bb) applies? If so, what should these 'unaudited accounts' comprise? And what exactly does the accountant's certification need to comprise, for that matter, particularly since he isn't claiming any business expenses?


Many warm thanks in advance for ANY help you all might offer.
All best wishes,
G.