Problems with Visa4UK website

[rathernicelydone]

Hi all - hope you can assist. Whilst on a trip to Paris our passports and my wife's BRP were stolen. We immediately applied for a replacement passport from the Pakistan embassy in Paris and the passport should be with us by this Tuesday 17th.

In the mean time I have submitted an application for an emergency BRP visa for my wife and an appointment has been made with TLS contact centre in Paris for this Wednesday. The problem is that despite taking the payment and sending through an email confirming the payment had been taken via Worldpay the visa4UK website is still showing my application next step as Pay For Application. It looks like the website is not registering the payment for some reason.

Does anyone know who I can report this problem to?

Having read some other topics I notice one forum user just turned up to Gare Du Nord with a copy of the passport, crime report and a copy of their BRP and were able to get through. My wife will try this as she has all these things (along with a UK driving license) but in case this doesn't work I would like to successfully submit the application.

Any help gratefully appreciated!

[rathernicelydone]

I thought I would detail my experience with the lost BRP of my wife in the hope that it will help other people.

As mentioned my wife had her Pakistani passport and her BRP stolen along with the British passports of my daughter and I. We immediately reported the documents stolen and got a police report. When we spoke to the British Consulate in Paris they informed us that they could provide Emergency Travel Documents for myself and my daughter but nothing for my wife.

We then went to the Pakistan embassy where we were told that they could provide an emergency travel document for my wife to go back to Pakistan but not anything for the UK. We decided to apply for a new Pakistani passport for her and to try to accelerate the process via an expedite with the best possible outcome of the passport taking a week to arrive.

As the week went on I realised that I would have to come back to the UK to apply for a Fast Track UK passport application so I could travel in 2 weeks’ time to the US for work. Although I did not want to leave my wife alone in Paris I felt I had no choice. I arranged the appointment for the ETD on Monday 16th April at 1030.

In the meantime I applied for a BRP visa for my wife on the visa4uk website but found that once it had taken the payment of £154/€183 it got stuck showing as payment not taken as described in the original post. Having called the Visa4UK phone line the person at the other end did not show any interest in my issue, could not provide specific guidance on my application error and gave me general advice apparently given to him by his supervisor saying I should wait 2 days and then cancel and resubmit my application. I was frankly appalled that I was paying £1.37 a minute for this type of advice. There was no other avenue I could see to solve this issue and I feel very sorry for non-British nationals who have to deal with this joke of a outsourced operation. I will be making a formal complaint and will also be writing to my MP.

With all confidence lost on the Visa4UK website I had a search of these immigration boards and found the very valuable post by user rk1234 titled BRP Lost Experience. My wife and I decided we would speak to the UK Border guards at Gare Du Nord when my daughter and I board the train.

We submitted all the paperwork along with the Eurostar confirmed booking at the consulate and were told to return at 1500 to collect the travel documents for myself and my daughter. I returned and our ETDs were ready. At 1800 we decided to head to Gare Du Nord as even though our train was at 2001 we wanted some extra time to speak to the border staff. Initially speaking to the Eurostar staff they said because they were so busy nobody from the border staff could come out and speak to us but as we had a ticket we could speak to them once it was our turn.

Before we could get to the UK border people we had to have our ETDs checked by the French police. They questioned why my daughter’s surname was not the same as mine and I explained that in some countries often the wife and children take the first name of the father/husband as the surname. The French border policewoman was not convinced and she asked for my daughter’s birth certificate. Luckily all my family’s important documents are stored on Dropbox and I was able to show her the birth certificate that showed me as the father. I was then able to get through.

When I approached the UK border staff I explained how our passports had been stolen and that we had been stuck as my wife did not have her passport or a BRP visa. I asked them that if she came back with her new Pakistani passport tomorrow would they let her on a train with a copy of her BRP? The border guard spoke to his boss who came out and took the BRP reference number to check its validity.

When she came back she asked if my wife was able to travel today. I told her that she could take the last train at 2100 back if she could head back to where we were staying nearby and get her suitcase. She told my wife to buy a Eurostar ticket for the 9pm train and she would sort out her travel arrangements. I explained that my wife did not have a passport and she said this was OK.

My wife then bought a Eurostar ticket, rushed back to our apartment and collected her bag and was able to return to Gare Du Nord. Her thumbprint was scanned and was matched to a valid BRP and so she was able to take the final train back to St Pancras.

The moral of the story is that the UK border guards can be sympathetic to your plight and it is definitely worth asking for their help. They were wonderful, along with the consulate staff whereas the Visa4UK service and call centre were frankly appalling.

Also keep all your important documents safely in a service like Dropbox with access via mobile or web – that really did help me out on this occasion.

I hope this story helps other who have similar problems.