Schengen visa application with less than 3 months on ILR

[Dengue Dave]

Dear All,

I have read with interest the posts regarding travelling to Europe with EU Spouse and hope to seek some guidance.

I am a UK citizen and live in the UK with my Indonesian wife and two UK children.

She was granted a spouse Visa in mid 2015 which we need to extend in March 2018.

We were planning a desperately needed run to Spain over Christmas, and had intended to apply for a Schengen Visa before travelling since we do not have any separate card, simply the Visa sticker in her passport.

We have noted from the Spanish Embassy website however that she must have three months or more remaining on her ILR, which by the time we travel she will not have this...

We then considered applying to extend her ILR early but the UK Gov website seems to indicate we can only do this within the last 28 days of the current Visa..ie February 2018.
This coupled with the additional Visa fee and NHS costs , if we did bring it forward ,mean that we couldn't afford the holiday anyway...

Does this mean that essentially she is unable to leave the country in the last three months, certainly to Europe?

We feel nervous about travelling without a Schengen Visa, with young kids in tow, since the chaos if we were refused travel at the airport would be too much for us...

Grateful for any guidance, and apologies if this scenario has been dealt with before...I couldn't find it...

Regards

[Dengue Dave]

Any response anyone please?

I have noted on the FCO website it states that passports only have to be valid for duration of trip, so cannot see why the ILR would have to extend further than this??

Regards

[mgb]

Due to article 134 of the schengen convention schengen rules are not applicable if community law say otherwise.
The eu directive 2004/38 give the right of entry for qualifying family members independently of the start country of the journey.
Some embassies simply ignore article 134 and community law.