british man marridge to none eu citzen with visitor visa

[gannanigel]

My new wife came to the uk from ukraine as a visitor a (miss) with a none working visa and as a single women her status has now changed to (Mrs). we are now being told by the uk home office that she can not stay longer than her visa, no one told us this when we applied to get wed, we submitted our passports and she her visa and we were allowed to get marride and now the home office 24h later inform us she must leave, regardless of our new marride status, or worst still her country being on the brink of war, she must return to a contry with a very real danger that she can not leave. The home office are saying she must return to the ukraine and apply from her country as my wife to return and stay with her british husband. Its discusting we are lost and seek help on what we can do, with Ukraine and its government being ran sacked and no control or support will be found she fears.
Ukraine is on the bring of war and only recently the army have been gathering ready to enter and support Ukraine with american support to enter and push back putins army have turned to focus on Isis.leaving ukraine unstable with government building being controled by different opposing sides from with in both ukraine and russia.
In ukraine it is stalemate, with government building being taken over by oposing forces and paper distroyed, leaves her not wanting to return for fear she will not be able to apply for a visa to enter the uk as my wife.
this has broken us a little with the uk saying when her visitor visa runs out she must return to her country.
we need your assistance, i hope this is not the case and that she has rights and as a british citzen, she can remain by my side as we start to build a new life together.

[Wanderer]

She needs to return to Ukraine and apply from there, Ukraine is safe, I visit Kiev for work regularly and there is no danger there. Which part of Ukraine is she from?

[Casa]

Wanderer is of course correct. Marriage to a British Citizen doesn't grant legal status to a spouse and it is impossible to switch from a visitor visa to any other visa category from within the UK. Previously permission from the Home Office to marry was required but this was removed in May 2011. However, technically your wife's visitor visa comes with the following conditions;
You can’t:
take paid or unpaid work
live in the UK for long periods of time through frequent visits
marry or register a civil partnership, or give notice of marriage or civil partnership
get private medical treatment
get public funds

However, although the Home Office frown on marrying while on a Visitor Visa, to avoid future problems with visa applications you would need to argue that 'there was no intention to marry on entry'. i.e Your intentions changed.

You can't blame the Home Office as this is the legal system in the UK and they wouldn't have been aware that the marriage was taking place unless the Registrar reported a possible sham marriage. You should have applied for a Fiance Visa, which is considerably more than the £83 Visitor Visa fee, £601 in fact. After the wedding you would have applied for a 2 year extension on form FLR(M) with a further fee of £885. Your only option now is for your wife to return to the Ukraine before her visitor visa expires and apply for a Spouse Settlement Visa - VAF(4a). The fee will be £885 and will give a probationary period of 2.5 years. She will have to pass the pre-entry A1 English test and you will have to submit evidence of earnings over £18,600 per annum. If you aren't in employment you would need £62,500 in savings, held in an accessible account for at least 6 months. You will also need to show that you have adequate accommodation and submit strong evidence of the relationship. Hopefully she mentioned that she has a fiance in her visitor visa application.
If she overstays her Visitor Visa she will be considered to be here illegally, which will have an adverse affect on any future visa applications.
She may want to sit the A1 English test while she is here to save taking it in the Ukraine, if she has time.

[Wanderer]

Further to this, just rent her a flat in Kiev, they are cheap as chips, £400 a mo will get you a good one, install her there and apply for spouse visa from there, simples!

Don't try and use the situation in Ukr as an excuse to bypass the rules, Ukr is a big place and West/Central zones are unaffected, there will be no war, it's Ukrainians fighting amongst themselves, Russia is not to blame.

PS. Putin is an idiot but not daft enough to start a war, get that out your head.

[gannanigel]

thank you for your help. It looks like romance is dead. From what you say here, my wife will have to return to ukraine and try from there, she is here on a visitors visa only. first we will try and contact the ukraine embasy in london. we have no money, just old fashioned romance at heart and now sadness.
she came here on a visitor visa only. and hopefully there will not be any restrictions or danger of war, ukraine is a beautiful place.
thank you. from these replys she will have to return, andy more pointer that we can use or follow we will try that.
i looked on the ukraine embasy website and it just might go to war we have no idea what will be.
ukraine might join the eu, but still we are simple easy going people simply in love with no history
knowledge of what we need or must have, not great really. bad news for us, and sadness all round, i guess.
thank you all for your help. we make no reference to ukraine war or england or visas, we simple got married
and from the ukraine web page its looks bad and who knows where we will be. no mention of putin pushing for control
or landlocking the country is made as excuse, well we are just looking at hopefully being together. we will try and go through the ukraine embasy and see what they have to say. i will read your comments again later but right now, just sadness.

[gannanigel]

she is from Ushgrod, she never came here with a view to marridge, so now we will try and go through the london ukraine embasy, i guess.

[Wanderer]

she is from Ushgrod, she never came here with a view to marridge, so now we will try and go through the london ukraine embasy, i guess.

Foreign relationships are freaking expensive mate, you're going to need a lot of cash and it never stops, my Russian partner usually has two trips home a year and that's a couple of grand a pop.

Do you fulfil the financial criteria for a spouse visa? You need to be earning £18,600 pa and are you aware of the cost of the visas, the one to return to UK on is an eye-watering £885 and that's one of the cheaper ones on the visa journey.

Ushgorod is Western Ukraine, well away from any conflict.

Ukraine won't allowed in EU in our lifetime that's for sure!

The good news is all you need to do is ensure she returns before her visa runs out, and apply for the visa (form VAF4A), fulfilling the criteria and pay the fee and she shouldn't be refused.

[Casa]

I can sympathise, but what do you hope to achieve from the Ukraine embassy? They are no jurisdiction over the issue of UK visas.
Are you not able to meet the £18,600 minimum earnings condition?

[gannanigel]

thank you, very helpful advise, what a wonderful website and helpful, when emotions are high from this end, it is very nice to have such a focused and informed person reply and help us focus.
already we think we will both go to kiev following what has been posted on here, we will enjoy her family and friends again, live in hope that things dont prevent an application to return and live in the uk, or even stay in ukraine. like i say we are simply in love and poor, so limited to what we can do. thank you from the bottom of my heart, wonderful and clear well informed advise, take care.

[John]

gannanigel, what you were hoping to achieve, getting from visitor visa to spouse visa in the UK, actually got legislated against as long ago as 01.04.2003! Yes over 11 years ago! When the change was made it was known as the "no switching rule".

Prior to 01.04.2003 people were coming to the UK as a visitor, getting married in the UK, then obtaining a spouse visa in the UK. At the time, before the "no switching rule" was introduced, more spouse visas were being issued in the UK than in embassies overseas! With visitor visas applied for overseas being significantly cheaper than spouse visas there was a huge loss of revenue to the Government.

So they acted, and stopped what was considered to be an abuse of the system.

So gannanigel , over 11 years later, you are caught by this clear rule. Go back to Ukraine and apply for the spouse visa there.

[Universal soldier]

And don't forget another route of surinder Singh under European route. According to that route take your wife to any EU country and find some work or do self employment there then return UK with Ukrainian wife on surinder Singh which bypass all earning £18600 criteria and she can get 5 years residence permit eea2. From Ukraine getting visit visa of other EU countries will be easy for wife and for romance it may be another alternative horizon to walk together.

[gannanigel]

from all this we learn married or not on this visitor visa she must return , i need to show i have enough to support us , and she need to accept her english is good enough to return. my wife now and she and i might not be able to be together, i guess im happy she is not pregnant as well. very very sad situation, we talk everyday to her friend in ukrine and it feels like war is comming they say, we can have no confidence, she and I can not think more about this we are broken, thank you for helping us. what a world, what a mess,