This is absolutely shocking and unacceptable. My heart goes out for you it is indeed a terrible terrible situation to be in. Did you try to raise it through your MP (I'm sure you would have done it, but just asking!). What UKBA doesnt realise is we are not bunch of application form they can stack u...

My husband applied for indefinite leave to remain in Dec 2000, we had a child 2002, by 2004 we were still waiting for a case worker to be assigned to our case! By 2006 we still had not had any reply from ukba, my husband requested our passports back to return to his country after 6yrs of being in UK...