michaelionheart wrote:So you're saying even though it's not a requirement and that we HAVEN'T met first that they would just deny me from going into the UK?
For the Marriage Visa, this will not be taken into consideration.
PaperPusher wrote:But if you look across the world, the countries and cultures with the lowest divorce rates are very often in societies where the married couples have met only once, or never, before getting married. Yet they manage successful long stable marriages.
I don't call a system of marriages with disgusting levels of spousal rape, domestic violence, child marriage, abduction and slavery in to forced marriage, infanticide and foeticide of girls, forced marriage and family revenge murders successful personally.
Yikes! I don't want to derail this thread, since I believe my comment was still somewhat on-topic. But do you consider a culture where 50% of the marriages end in divorce 'successful'? Because that's the current situation in my home culture of birth and upbringing, and we sure as heck don't consider that successful at all. And as painful as it may be for you to accept, there are plenty of marriages from these low-divorce-rate societies where the couples and their families are very happy. I know several myself, mostly inlaws. My original point was that we shouldn't have broad sweeping assumptions about the success of the OP's relationship in the long term based on whether they have met. Right now, he just needs and wants the opportunity to give it a try. The Marriage Visitor visa neither makes nor does it insist on any assumptions in this regards. So as far as that visa is concerned, we can leave that out of the discussion.
Wanderer wrote:michaelionheart wrote:Random question but.. what would we need to prove that we have been in a relationship for 3 years now?
A miracle.
If they've got transcripts and records of their online chat, emails, and other correspondance, especially 3 years of such, then that will do just fine. I know this from personal experience.
Casa wrote:You're going to have to convince the Entry Officer that your relationship is genuine but you intend to return to the US after the wedding without overstaying your visa.
I think the biggest concern here is the finances. The general presumption for the Marriage Visitors visa, when one of the couple is resident in the UK, is that either the non-resident will come back to join his/her spouse in the UK shortly after, or the UK resident will leave to join his/her spouse in their home country shortly after or maybe even with him when he leaves to go back. It will be very obvious that the OP's wife-to-be currently has no chance of sponsoring her husband within the next six months, and very possibly for another year or so. So unless he presents some iron clad ties to the U.S. obviously preventing him from joining her immediately, or she shows that she is obviously progressing on the way to meeting the financial requirements (a recently acquired job and a bit of growing savings), I think the case worker may refuse the visa on that point of instability alone. One point of note here: She doesn't have to sponsor you for this visa. Her parents can. But this concern is still there nonetheless.
And there isn't even an option of deception here (I know you weren't thinking that, but I want to make this clear, just the same, so the thought is swept away now before it even occurs) and trying to say that she will be going to live with him, something I think might be the easier and better idea. While the UK immigration officer deciding this case will not necessarily be an expert on U.S. immigration, it's likely he or she will have enough experience to know that the process for bringing a spouse to the U.S. involves a considerable amount of time and investment, something I myself know from direct personal experience. If you haven't begun that process or can show that you are going to begin that process immediately, they'll almost certainly pick up on that. They've just been around this block too many times.
I still think that of all the advice given on this thread, my recommendations posted earlier are the best ones given. Plan this out over the next two years atleast. Get her working, multiple jobs if necessary, and living in her own place. Have two trips in those two years, one where you visit her, and one where she visits you. Then go for the fiance visa. If you go this route, unless one of you joins Al Queda or something similarly crazy happens, I rate your chance of success at 99%. No one anywhere can question your dedication or sincerity then.
