I think its the same flat fee for all 1 to 10 year visit visas.
And the fee for 6 months, as you said, is a lot less - only about one third!.
Also bear in mind that even if you get issued with a 10 year long visa, the maximum duration of continuous stay permitted for all visas is 6 months.
(This could even change to 3 months, based on the recent proposals, so a 10 year visa is really handy)
Also, unless your parents are planning to come more than 3 or 4 times in the next 5 or 10 years (if you can plan for that long!) consider the practicalities in that aspect before applying since the cost is much lesser for 2 short visits than compared to taking 5/10 years and visiting just twice using the same visa!
Re: writing sponsorship letter, you dont have to do research on papers from Oxford, keep it plain simple; write something like
"Since I foresee a need for multiple short visits for my parents in the next 3 to 5 years for various reasons <state for e.g, kids birthday celebrations, family get-togethers, tourism etc> I would be grateful if you could please issue a long term visa for 5/10 years". Please
do not write that they are coming to spend time with your son, that is like leaving room for interpretation.
Also, qualifying for a long term 5/10 visa depends on whether your parents have had enough visits in UK already plus their other circumstances like job & other immigration status held etc (in your case they've had at least 2 UK visits so that would be less an issue)
mama wrote:Hi all
I am a work permit holder living/working in the UK with my husband and son since 2003. My parents have come to visit us twice for a period of 3 months and both times, have applied for visitor visas for a period of only 6 months.
We want them to come again in July to spend some time with our son. This time, we want them to apply for a visitor visa for 5 years since they plan to come visit us every year. I just had a few questions:
1. does anyone know of anyone who has applied for 5 years or even 2-3 years visitor visas and got it ? Or would you recommend just applying for 6 months? The reason I ask is the difference in fees - it costs a lot for 5 years! And if they only give for 6 months in the end, it is a waste of money.
2. I need to write a sponsorship letter for them. I have always written the dates they plan to come and visit us in previous letters. This time, since they are applying for longer duration visa, will the letter need to be any different? I was planning on writing that they are visiting us to get to know their grandson and strengthen family ties. Is that good enough?
Does anyone have a template they can share with me?
Thank you all for your suggestions/advice in advance
