UK residency rules to join a family member in the UK

[ukthesis]

I am a UK citizen but this year I married my wife from Moldova. She lives in Moldova and is a Moldovan citizen. I visit her regularly visit her in Moldova (outside the EU) from the UK and she asks about the situation where she might need to join me in the UK if, for example, I need to have long term NHS care as a UK resident. We are still deciding if she should get UK settlement status but the UK residency criteria are a real problem because of their apparent inflexibility.

In the situation as described, where she comes to the UK to be with me if I end up in NHS care but has no current plans to take up UK settlement or citizenship.

She is not really happy that she would only, under the UK residency rules (Temporary Leave to Remain and Indefinite Leave to Remain) be able to leave the UK for only 90 days in a year (making the 450 days in 5 years). She has quite a lot of commitments built up in Moldova in her 51 years of life, business and family, and 90 days may not be enough.

She would initially come to join me from Moldova using the family of a settled person visa. According to the website, this visa can last for over 6 months.

https://www.gov.uk/join-family-in-uk/overview

The website talks about her bring able to extend the visa after 6 months, but makes no mention of whether, if she does this, she will then be caught up in the settlement procedure which then means she is stuck with only being able to leave the UK for 90 days a year. Nor does it mention whether, using that family of a settled person visa, if she returns temporarily to Moldova, this may count against her (count against that 450 days allowed).

Basically, because of the limiting residency criterion attached to the TLR and the IRL she is trying to find out if there is a way around this. The joining family of a settled person seems as though this may be one way, but can anyone please advise?

Another way around this may be that even under the TLR and IRL rules, there is some discretion over their operation that can be applied by the Border Agency in ""exceptional" cases.

[Casa]

Please don't continually open new threads, it becomes far too confusing to keep up with your posts. Post this here where most of your questions have already been answered:
http://www.immigrationboards.com/immigr ... 80-20.html