EEA Family Permit to join my husband

[abraCadabra]

I am planning to apply for EEA FP soon to join my EU husband who is self employed in UK. This is my second marriage and for my husband it is his first marriage. I am currently outside of EU. I hope to get some advice here as I am really stressed about my application and feel huge responsibility to get it right. I have a feeling my application is not going to be "straightforward" and I don't want to let my husband down in any way. The thing is I have been married before to another EU citizen and lived with him in UK since 2010. I arrived on EEA FP and later got 5 year residence card, it was valid from Dec 2012 to Dec 2017. So my first marriage turned out to be unhappy and after one year(2013) of problems in our marriage we finally separated around the beginning of 2014. I did not leave UK upon our separation, and we only officially divorced in June 2017. Back to 2014 - I met my second husband in August 2014, we genuinly fell in love with each other and been a couple since October 2014. In March 2017 I left UK to visit my mother. My resicence card was still valid until December 2017, but I chose not to travel back to UK because I have been out of contact with my first husband since early 2014 and feared not being admitted back to UK. So, I got my divorce in June 2017. During my absence from UK we have been in contact with my current husband every day and finally he came over for 2 months, we got married in April, and now he is back to work in UK since May. We cannot wait for the moment when I will be able to join him there and I am going to apply for my visa soon, we are just getting all the bits ready for my application. I don't know how to phrase my question here. I have an idea of what supporting documents to provide, so I guess it is rather, Do you think I have a good chance to actually get EEA FP to join my second husband? I am feeling terrible now, as I am not sure whether the circumstances of my first marriage and the fact that we were separated from 2014, but I only left UK in March 2017, make me an overstayer??? I have also read on another forum that EEA FP takes 5 months to process. Both me and my husband are terribly missing each other

[abraCadabra]

Will the circumstances of my first marriage affect my new application in a negative way? Will I be considered as having previously overstayed and refused my application on this basis? Since our bitter separation in early 2014 me and my first husband had been completely out of contact and I am not sure whether he stayed in UK or not. It was a really bad break up basically. I am now very happy in my new relationship (since Oct 2014), we were really happy to be able to get married in April this year. Do you think I can be refused as overstayer? I will die if this happens, and my husband will be devastated too What can you advise?

[Richard W]

Do you think I can be refused as overstayer? I will die if this happens, and my husband will be devastated too What can you advise?

Are you in fact an overstayer? If your first husband remained in the UK as a qualified person (e.g. a worker until you left the UK, which was before the decree absolute finalised the divorce, then by the Diatta judgement you were lawfully resident in the UK as a family member of your first husband!

You cannot be refused as an overstayer, even if you were.

Purely on the timelines of residence and marital status, the case worker may suspect that your second marriage is one of convenience. I therefore recommend that you provide evidence that your relationship with your second husband goes back to October 2014.

Are you a visa national? If not, you should consider not waiting for a family permit but just travelling to the UK and attempting to enter on an EEA Regulations stamp. Your husband should travel with you or make sure he is at the airport to meet you, though this isn't a legal necessity. Being in mobile phone contact would be good.

[abraCadabra]

Do you think I can be refused as overstayer? I will die if this happens, and my husband will be devastated too What can you advise?

Are you in fact an overstayer? If your first husband remained in the UK as a qualified person (e.g. a worker until you left the UK, which was before the decree absolute finalised the divorce, then by the Diatta judgement you were lawfully resident in the UK as a family member of your first husband!

You cannot be refused as an overstayer, even if you were.

Purely on the timelines of residence and marital status, the case worker may suspect that your second marriage is one of convenience. I therefore recommend that you provide evidence that your relationship with your second husband goes back to October 2014.

Are you a visa national? If not, you should consider not waiting for a family permit but just travelling to the UK and attempting to enter on an EEA Regulations stamp. Your husband should travel with you or make sure he is at the airport to meet you, though this isn't a legal necessity. Being in mobile phone contact would be good.

I am a visa national and I cannot travel without a FP. I know for sure that my first husband came back to his country at some point, I just don't know the exact date, but it was some time in 2014 as I understood. What should I write in my cover letter about that? For them I am an overstayer... SO you're saying they would refuse as "marriage of convenience"? That would kill me, honestly. We have chat history only since I left UK, because before that we were living together and communicated by phone. We have changed handsets since 2014, so I don't have phone records dating back to 2014. The proof I have of living together is bank statements for the same address. I am also thinking to provide a statement from a friend who knows us both, confirming that we've been together since 2014... As I said, I feel so responsible for my second husband now, he is such a wonderful person and he never went through all this visa nightmare previously and that's why I want to do all I can to spare him from being upset because of refusal Because it would be my fault, wouldn't it? So, the situation with my first marriage, which is long time in the past, is going to destroy our current marriage? I will die

[abraCadabra]

Are you in fact an overstayer? If your first husband remained in the UK as a qualified person (e.g. a worker until you left the UK, which was before the decree absolute finalised the divorce, then by the Diatta judgement you were lawfully resident in the UK as a family member of your first husband!

You cannot be refused as an overstayer, even if you were.

Purely on the timelines of residence and marital status, the case worker may suspect that your second marriage is one of convenience. I therefore recommend that you provide evidence that your relationship with your second husband goes back to October 2014.

Thank you for your reply

It's very helpful to know that I cannot be refused as an overstayer, it gives me some peace of mind to concentrate on trying to provide the best evidence I can regarding relationship with my second husband going back to 2014. Unfortunately not so much of "hard" evidence is available due to that: 1. We always lived together but moved a few times in the first year and cannot show address 2. We took photos of each other but not much of us together... 3. We upgraded handsets since then and no phone record is available from so long time ago. I have many photos together now, but they are from this year only, when he was here for 2 months. Now it appears bad to have not collected hard evidence, but I was rather concentrated on making our relationship work back then

I can show evidence from 2016 as he was supporting me financially. But for 2014-2015 I don't have hard evidence, at the moment I can only think of our common friends' testimonies.

[Richard W]

I can show evidence from 2016 as he was supporting me financially. But for 2014-2015 I don't have hard evidence, at the moment I can only think of our common friends' testimonies.

That should be sufficient. The point is to show that your marriage is not one of convenience; that you haven't just married your husband so as to live in the UK.

[abraCadabra]

I can show evidence from 2016 as he was supporting me financially. But for 2014-2015 I don't have hard evidence, at the moment I can only think of our common friends' testimonies.

That should be sufficient. The point is to show that your marriage is not one of convenience; that you haven't just married your husband so as to live in the UK.

Thank you! I hope we will be able to convince them.