All Articles: Entry clearance

The “sole responsibility” immigration test comes into play where one of the parents of a child is relocating to the United Kingdom and one parent remains abroad. The United Kingdom’s immigration rules effectively presume that a child should remain outside the country with the other parent, unless the parent moving...

15th November 2023
BY Colin Yeo

It appears that we may start seeing changes in overseas visa processing centres soon, after TLScontact was unsuccessful in an attempt to stop the Home Office from entering into a new contract with VFS Global. The case is Teleperformance Contact Ltd v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2023]...

19th October 2023
BY Sonia Lenegan

Making a mistake on an immigration application form can be disastrous. If the mistake is interpreted by officials as an attempt to mislead or deceive, the application may be refused. If the application was for entry clearance, it can also lead to a ten-year ban on re-entry to the UK....

31st August 2023
BY Colin Yeo

The Home Office has published guidance on fee waivers for entry clearance applications (in other words, when it is possible to get a visa for free). This is important as the fees are set at a level that is prohibitive for many families. The waiver application form is here. The...

30th June 2022
BY Sonia Lenegan

As a result of the almost aggressively complex way our immigration system works, not just in law but procedure as well, Ukrainians applying under the Ukraine Family Scheme or Homes for Ukraine may appear to be granted less time in the UK than they were promised. Applicants to both schemes...

29th March 2022
BY Alex Piletska

In another blow for the Home Office on visa application fees, the department has been forced to concede that its policy on fee waivers for entry clearance applications is unlawful.  Fee waiver policies At time of writing, the relevant guidance states that applicants outside the UK can only be granted...

8th March 2021
BY Mary Atkinson

Sometimes a migrant here in the UK unlawfully will want to apply for immigration status. Lawyers and the Home Office often call this “regularising” their status, because the person becomes a “regular” migrant within the rules rather than an “irregular” one outside the rules. One of the ways to do...

1st May 2020
BY Nath Gbikpi

Earlier this week, the Guardian published the story of Amber Murrey, a US academic who got a job at Oxford as an associate geography professor, but whose two daughters, aged 4 and 9, were refused visas to join her in the UK. The story explains that Ms Murrey’s husband lives...

4th October 2019
BY Nath Gbikpi

Since July 2012 the immigration rules for adult dependent relatives have been, in practice, almost impossible to meet. Applicants need to demonstrate that they require a level of long-term personal care that they are unable to get in their home country, either due to cost or availability. This makes it...

8th November 2017
BY Colin Yeo

Improvements have been made to the quality of decisions and to record-keeping in the Home Office’s Visa Section in Jordan. However, the decision makers regularly failed to take supporting evidence adequately into account, and, in a fifth of cases, based their decision on incorrect facts. The Amman Visa Section is a visa...

6th November 2015
BY Paul Erdunast

The issue of when the Upper Tribunal might make a mandatory order requiring the Home Office to act in a specific way was considered in the case of R (on the application of Sultana) v Secretary of State for the Home Department (mandatory order – basic principles) IJR [2015] UKUT 226...

20th May 2015
BY Colin Yeo

Where an immigration official alleges that a document used in an application is false or forged, a ‘Document Verification Report’ (DVR) is routinely prepared. This report states the reasons why immigration officials believe the document is false. It is vital that an applicant suspected of deception can answer the charge,...

5th November 2013
BY Colin Yeo

An application for entry clearance is made on the date on which payment of the relevant fee is made.

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12th August 2013
BY Colin Yeo

F (Para 320(8); type of leave) USA [2013] UKUT 00309 (IAC) New reported immigration tribunal case on paragraph 320(18) of the immigration rules, one of the discretionary general grounds for refusal. The Entry Clearance Officer had failed to exercise discretion one way or t’other. In this case there was only...

10th July 2013
BY Colin Yeo

As of today the full right of appeal against refusal of a visit visa sponsored by a family member in the UK has been abolished. Combined with the recently announced pilot of £3,000 ‘bonds’ payable for visitors to the UK, it is clear the Government is making it increasingly difficult...

25th June 2013
BY Colin Yeo

Last week, Free Movement posted the fruits of a FoI request disclosing the statistics in relation to partner applications from pre- and post-July 2012.  These figures were then analysed and fair conclusions were drawn in relation to gender discrimination on the basis that female sponsors generally earn less than male...

20th June 2013
BY Sarah Pinder

Last month saw the advent of a very useful decision from the High Court concerning the lack of provision in the Immigration Rules to allow migrants in the Points-Based System to switch whilst in-country into a PBS dependent category: Zhang, R (on the application of) v SSHD [2013] EWHC 891 (Admin).  The...

28th May 2013
BY Sarah Pinder

Just a quick note to flag something up that emerged from the forum a couple of weeks ago. A friend of the blog was kind enough to share a mine of policy documents obtained by Freedom of Information request and, not only that, but the friend also OCR (optical character...

5th April 2013
BY Colin Yeo

The Chief Inspector of the UK Border Agency, John Vine, has published a global review of entry clearance decision making. The findings are strongly critical in important respects. The sample size was nearly 1,500 case files from every entry clearance post, so the review certainly was a global one. Vine...

20th December 2011
BY Free Movement

The case of R (on the Application of Atapattu) v The Secretary of State for the Home Department [2011] EWHC 1388 (Admin) (27 May 2011) is an important case that I was just too busy to write up at the time but to which a return is worthwhile. It concerns the unlawful retention...

5th October 2011
BY Colin Yeo
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