HELP! standard visitor visa for spouse of UK citizen

[anthonydoh]

Hi. Hoping some of you can help as I am running into brick walls with this one.

I am a UK citizen, my wife is Filipino. We both live in Bermuda and have done for many years. She requires a visa to travel to the UK. It's just for a visit - we are not seeking to move to the UK. (We lived in the UK briefly in 2011 and she had a 5 year residence card, but we didn't stay long, and her residence card has now expired and so she needs to go back to applying for visas).

I started the application 3 months before she planned to travel. I tried to select a date for the biometric appointment but nothing was available for July and August, which were the only 2 months displayed.

I wasted £5 emailing the 'helpline' who just pasted a load of unhelpful guidance from the website. I have sent them follow up emails but they have not replied.

I have checked again and now September is also showing up, but once again all the dates are greyed out. So, to summarise, it is impossible to select any date for the biometric appointment in July, August or September.

I tried contacting VFS - the company that does the biometric appointments, but they only redirect me to the paid-for, unhelpful, helpline. I looked up other phone numbers for them but they are out of service or just simply wrong numbers.

I have no idea where to turn next to try and get to the next stage of this visa application. According to the VFS website, there are only ten appointment days in Bermuda each year, but one of those is in September but is not showing up. I have been checking it two or three times a day so I assume it isn't just booked out, it seems to me that they haven't loaded the available dates into the calendar.

But where can I turn to next? There is nothing and no one who can help. Having to wait until September means waiting seven weeks from when I started the application - it is doubtful we would even get the visa before we plan to travel in October. And as I said, September isn't even showing up as available.

Is anyone aware of any better options for visit visas (non-immigration) for the spouse of a UK citizen?