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Entry with Passport
In July, 2002 I moved to England to be with my then boyfriend, David. We had met in Michigan over a year earlier while he was there with his job, and after the long, painful ordeal of long-distance inter-continental romance we decided enough was enough. I did all the research and found that I was ineligible for any kind of visa. I don't have a college degree so no one is going to sponsor me for a work visa, I didn't have the money to go to school for a student visa, the list goes on and on. So what we decided to do was that I'd go to England for 5 months on my passport alone, since an American passport allows an American citizen to spend up to 6 months continualkly overseas with no problem. (No problem my ass, I would say later.) Anyway, the whole point of me and David living together in the same country was to solidify our relationship and make sure we knew what we were getting into: basically to see if we wanted to get married - which is hard to do with an ocean between you to say the least. That meant I couldn't apply for a fiancee visa either, since we weren't engaged. Anyway, July comes around, things are great, I've quit my jobs, we're excited... the flight goes well... and then all hell breaks lose. I get to the Immigration control point at Heathrow and they don't want to let me into the country. Why? I didn't have enough money in the bank to support myself for 5 months as a visitor, and they basically didn't believe my (true) story about wanting to live with my boyfriend and then I'd be coming back to America afterwards. To them it looked like I was just trying to sneak into the country, possibly to get married, potentially to mooch off public funds (welfare), and that I had every intention of living in England forever. Which is not allowed on a passport. So they interrogated me for 5 hours, put me in a cell, interrogated David (who I hadn't been able to talk to through all of this), made phot copies of my diary, bank statements, check book, and address book, and tried as hard as they could to find fault with my story. At the end of the day they couldn't, me & David's story matched (because it was true, but do I need to keep reminding you of that?), and they let me go after finally believing I was coming back to America after 5 months, that David would pay for me to be there and I had no real expenses, that he had a good enough job to do this, and that we wouldn't get married in England. To say the least, this was a horrific experience. For people in our situation, I'd still recommend doing what we did, but oh my God I'd have done some things differently. Anyway, we got through. I lived quite happily in England for 5 months and on the last day of my visit, while in London, David and I got engaged. Whee!
Fiancee Visa
So now to get BACK into England I needed a fiancee visa. Easy enough. I downloaded the forms from the internet (again, check out my links page for the IND site) and got all our crap together. I had heard from a lot of people to bring more than what they ask for because you can never be too careful, and so I did. David was still in England when I applied for the visa, so I needed a letter from his maying he knew what I was doing and supported my application. He also had to Fed-Ex me his passport and birth certificate, which made us both a bit paranoid, but there you go. So I go to the Chicago British Consulate on a bitterly cold day in January with my parents.We got to the Wrigley building at 8:45 and they let us wait in the lobby to go up the elevator at exactly 9:00. We went up (they let my parents come with), through security, and into the teeny room. I took a number (3). When I was called up to the window I was frantic with nerves, but had everything organized in a binder, and thought I had all my ducks in a row. I was nervous because I didn't have bank statements from either one of us, because the fine letter of the documents I read said I needed either bank statements proving he could support me, or a letter from his company proving the same thing. We had a letter from his company, but at the last minute I was paranoid it wasn't enough. So anyway, the lady at the window was really nice ... it was a bulltproof window like at a gas station, no private room like I had imagined ... and took my passport, David's passport, my new passport photos, my letter of intent, David's letter of intent, the application forms, the letter from David's employer, David's divorce papers, and a letter from his parents saying we could stay with them. They didn't care about my phone records, photos, or anything like that... but I'm really glad I brought them anyway! It helped that I had an engagement ring on as well, she asked if I had one and thought it was lovely. Tee hee! SO, the one snag was that I didn't have the deed (or a copy of it) to David's parent's house - proving that they own and have the right to offer us housing. So I had to call David right there from the office and have him get the deed from his mom and fax it over, the lasy said if they received the fax before 4 we'd be fine. So I called back at 2:00 to see if they had the fax, they did, and everything was peachy. The most annoying part of the day though was when we got back to the South tower at 3:50... ten minutes early to pick the bloody thing up... and they wouldn't let us wait in the building at all! They did in the morning, but nooooo... not now! Not in the freezing cold weather! So we had to go back outside and stand outside the window for 10 minutes until we could go back in and get on the elevator. A-nnoy-ing. But oh well. And here's what I learned: The Consulate is in the South Tower, which is the one closest to the River. They don't let you up on the 13th floor to wait if you're a little early (even by 5 minutes!) and they don't let you wait in the main lobby of the building either, so if you're not exactly on time - go to the Starbucks nearby. Easy parking is at the Lakeshore Athletic Club, one block away. I wish I could remember the address... but their parking garage isn't just for members it's for the public too, and it couldn't have been in a more convenient place.
Further Leave to Remain Visa
So David and I got married on Friday, March 28 at a really lovely Registry ceremony, which is England's non religious, justice-of-the-peace type deal. It was gorgeous and emotional and perfect, and the reception afterwards was brilliant as well! Some of my family flew over for it, and there wasn't a drop of rain the whole week they were there! But anyway... 4 days after we got married David & headed down to Croydon (in London) to get my FLR. We got in line at 6:30 am and there was already a hefty line built up. I had seen pictures of the place online and thought "oh, at least it's heated". Um... I was wrong! It's covered, but not heated, and my toes were very angry with me afterwards for not wearing warmer socks. There's a Subway nearby (yeah, the sandwich shop!) and some other places to get coffee, and David went on several runs. We were glad we had our phones on us though because I'd text him "Line has shifted, I'm by the so and so" a lot! We got in the building at 8:15 (we were number 206), and after a brief interview with a lady (we just showed her our application and visas) we went up to the 2nd floor to wait. And wait. And wait. And get annoyed. And wait. We got up to the window at 10:45 (thank God we had brough books and magazines) and walked out of there with my (surprisingly ugly - why couldn't it be as pretty as my fiancee visa?) stamp at 11:15! So all in all it was pretty quick, at just under 6 hours. The lady behind the window said that as of April 1, 2003 (only a week before I got it!) the law had changed, and FLR visas are now good for two years and not one, but it only applies to visas received since April 2st, not old ones. So I don't have to go down there for another 2 years! This visa means I'm married and can now work and live in England for the next 2 years. If after 2 years I'm still in England, I can then apply for an Indefinite Leave to Remain. The whole process was pretty painless except for one minor blip when the lady behind the counter (hereby known as LBC) wanted to see David's bank statements. I told her we didn't need them, and asked her to show me on the form where it said we did. I, being very tired, very nearly threw a fit but David calmed me down. The whole point of getting the fiancee visa after all was that we proved he could support me, so why would I have to do that again 3 months later? Anyway, she apologized, and we got our visa tout suite. And filling out the form could NOT have been any easier, thanks to me already having a fiancee visa issued in Chicago. There's a part on the form that basically says "Before arriving in the UK did you get a fiancee visa? If so, skip the next 15 questions". And those 15 questions were all the hard ones! So basically my fiancee visa was proof that he could support me financially, etc, as they wouldn't have given it to me to begin with unless they felt confident I wouldn't go on public funds. At the end of the day all I showed them was our two passports, our marriage certificate, and the filled out form. That's it. I'm still really glad I brought loads of other "just in case" documentation, in case LBC decided to be grouchy - but at the end of the day we didn't need them. I was planning on going alone, but the thought of me carrying our birth certificates, passports, marriage certificate etc... all by my lonesome in a ruck sack, then getting on a series of trains, tubes etc to get back home - well, I would have been scared the whole time of being robbed. It's like I had our lives in an A4 sized folder - so David came along for "protection". Ha! Anyway - gotta go! I'm at the library with 20 minutes of internet, am heading off for a 2 week break in America, then will be back and on the hunt for a job. Blech!
And soooooo...
That's my immigration story so far... definitely to be continued!
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