We've just been successful in obtaining my wife's FLR (M) this morning at the Glasgow Service Centre. Absolutely delighted!
I thought I'd share a few tips to help people in future. Particularly as my accounting dates for my sole trader business (earning around £23k a year) run from May - May and the tax year runs April - April - we initially struggled to get clarification on whether this was allowed or not (it was!).Background: My wife had a Tier 5 Youth Mobility Scheme Visa, it was due to expire on Tuesday (meaning a rejection today could have meant her having to leave the country tomorrow!). We were married in March in Edinburgh and live together. It was a "simple" switch from Tier 5 to FLR (M).
Both myself and my wife are reasonably intelligent people, but some of the FLR (M) guidelines seem ambiguous on first read. I phoned the Visa Office but was told they could not give us clarification on certain terms as "if we give you the wrong advice then you may sue us". Great. One thing that did help was speaking to a registered Immigration lawyer - initially they will often give some free advice on a certain issue - but we gathered up a list of questions (probably about 15) and did a Q&A style phone call for £150. We were allowed to ask any follow up questions within a week, which we did (another 3 or 4 questions). It might sound expensive, but compared to the £1,500-£2,000 on paying a lawyer for the full shebang was great value.
We had our appointment at the Glasgow Service Centre at 8am this morning - we arrived 20 minutes early (you're supposed to be at least 15 mins early for security). As others have said it's almost like airport security. We were quickly processed through this, straight to a guy at the desk to take our details then onto another guy who said he was our case officer. He explained what would happen and took our documents and photocopies. We sat in the waiting area, and around 20 minutes later my wife was called to do her biometrics.
Then, around 8:50 we were called over and given the news that our application had been successful! Just over an hour from entering the building to getting it all sorted, we were both over the moon! I've got to say the staff were all pretty decent too. I think being the first appointment in the morning we were before anyone else that's part of the reason we were so quick (that and submitting photocopies and being a fairly straightforward case too).
Here's what we submitted, in order:
-Contents Page (Basic version of the below list)
FORMS AND COVERING LETTERS
-FLR (M) Checklist (3 page document you can print out from your online booking confirmation page)
-FLR (M) Form (All 79 pages completed and triple checked, envelope with our passport photos with names written on back of photos (2 of wife, 1 of me) attached to relevant page at start of section 1)
-Covering letter from my wife (short paragraphs about application; our relationship; financial requirement being met; husband owns property; clarification on correspondence (explaining we only had one bill in joint names as we had not changed anything yet, also it had been a struggle as most bills we have are online but we had provided enough documents))
-Covering letter from myself (covering similar things - about us; my job and we meet the financial requirement etc)
-My wifes current and previous passport (all passports she's held during her time in the UK)
-My wife's old Biometric residence permit
-My own passport
*FINANCIAL DOCUMENTS - (SELF EMLPLOYED CAT F)
-Covering letter from accountant
-Last years (16/17) Tax Return (printed out from PC, showing figures for my accounting period)
-Last years (16/17) Tax Schedule and Tax Calculation from accountant (these are equivalent to the SA302 and SA300)
-SA302 (For tax year 16/17 from Inland Revenue, probably not required as we already gave similar above, but probably better with too much than too little)
-Business Bank Statements (for my 12 month accounting period relating to the last tax year)
-Personal Bank Statements (for my 12 month accounting period relating to the last tax year)
-Accountants Certificate of Confirmation (from my accountant, make sure they are registered with one of required accountancy bodies)
-Unaudited Accounts for the last full financial year
-A recent statement from a company and bill related to my work (to help show continued trading - this on its own may not have been enough but coupled with the below recent bank statements showing business transactions I figured it would be fine)
-Further business and personal accounts up to current date (This will not be necessary for most sole traders - we were only recommended to submit these by our lawyer as my accounting period is different to the tax year)
ACCOMMODATION / CORRESPONDENCE DOCUMENTS
-We listed and submitted around 19 documents in total (probably overkill, but figured it was better to have too many than too little and have one or two rejected as not suitable. We only had one in joint names so needed at least 5 others each (from at least two other companies each) to meet the required minimum.)
-Current mortgage statement (I've seen on forums and had advice from our lawyer that we need to prove we either own or rent (or staying with relatives etc) our house - although funnily enough I've never seen this listed as a requirement anywhere in the form or guidance notes, but we submitted it regardless)
RELATIONSHIP
-Marriage certificate (this was all we needed to produce here as already living in the UK and married here)
-Photos (around 26 of our wedding and trips away together printed off our PC - not asked for but our lawyer said it might help)
Additionally we provided both our birth certificates and her most recent payslip to show she was working, though these were not necessary and tbh probably not even looked at.
We also made photocopies of every document apart from the forms, covering letters and photos, and arranged them in the same order as above - this helps speed up the process and tbh anything that helps make the officer's life easier would hopefully reflect well on you if you need any additional help!
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* With regard to my financial position - I am unusual in that my accounting period does not run the same as the tax year. My accountant says that only 2 of his other clients have their tax set up like this as a sole trader - while it's unusual it's still absolutely permitted by HMRC for sole traders to do their accounts this way. Most people will have their accounting period the same as the tax year i.e. at time of writing from 6th April 2016 - 5th April 2017 and will submit their bank statements etc for the same period. The following only applies if (like me) your tax year and accounting period are different - My accounting period for the last tax year was 9th May 2015 - 8th May 2016, so my accountant did my unaudited accounts and 16/17 tax return based on these dates and I submitted bank statements to cover these dates too. The guidance notes seem to suggest that this is not even a possibility and searching the forums most people did not believe it was possible either - but (at least in our case!) it was accepted no issues!
The immigration lawyer also said it would be fine too, but suggested we also submit my personal and business statements from May 2016 to current date in order to demonstrate that I still maintain a similar level of income, which we did.
Other Prep and advice: Read the forms, and all relevant guidance notes thoroughly. Also searching previous posts on forums such as these gives a good general insight into what is required - although paying for an immigration lawyers time like we did can help further.
Hope that helps some people - obviously everyone will be different but that's the basic gist of what we did.
Cheers,
Stuart
