A bit of history about my visa (It wont take long
)I came here in October 2001 as a student, and then found employment and got my first Work Permit, valid from 17th November 2006. Since then, I switched to Tier 1, and have also renewed it once.
Based on that, I have 2 questions:
1) Is the earliest date I can apply in person October 17th 2011? (I read somewhere that you can apply upto 1 month in advance of your 5 year visa anniversary)
2) Do I need to show more points that my previous tier 1 application? I ask this because I claimed quite a lot of points in my last Tier 1 renewal due to good bonus paid by the company. Ofcourse, bonus being a bonus, its not guaranteed, and I'm afraid I don't have the same number of points this time when applying, but I am still comfortably above the minimum threshold for a Tier 1 (FYI, I renewed my Tier 1 in March this year, so bonus for the second half hasn't been paid anyways)
Thanks in advance for all your help.