FLR(M) Mail Question/General Application Thread

Hello,

This website was extremely helpful for me when I prepared my spouse entry visa back in 2019. Now I need to turn to you again as I get my FLR(M) application together.

We had to wait for my wife's latest pay day (today) to afford the fees, which means we now also have to include her August payslip to meet the 6-month financial requirements. That cuts things pretty close because my BRP expires on 4 Sept., but her employer is supposed to authenticate her payslips and sign her employment letter on Tuesday, 30 Aug. (it's a small business of 30 people and the CEO's office is just upstairs so all should go smoothly). I plan to file my application on 31 Aug.

Today, I've been organizing our mail correspondence. I mostly have it covered, but I had a couple of questions. Since I'm filing by 31 Aug., I need 2 years of mail spaced out between Aug. 2022 and Aug. 2020. We live with a relative, so none of the bills are in our name. We also have separate bank accounts for various accounting reasons. So I'm providing 6 separate pieces of mail for each of us from sources such as HMRC, the NHS, and our banks. However, the ONLY mail I happen to have of my wife's from Aug. 2020 is a finance agreement from the lender who financed her car that month. I also have the V5 from the DVLA for the same car...but it only says the car was purchased in Aug. 2020, it's not an actual letter with a date on it.

Will the finance agreement from the lender be good enough? How about the V5? I have several other pieces of mail from July 2020 and Sept. 2020, but I can't find anything else from Aug. Advice?

Thanks so much!  I know I'll have more questions over the next few days as I rush to get my application in. 

***UPDATE***

Okay, so this is what I ended up with for correspondence:


Applicant (Me)

Aug 2020 - NHS letter
Jan 2021 - GP letter
June 2021 - Halifax bank statement (online pdf with address)
Nov 2021 - NHS letter
Apr 2022 - HMRC letter
Aug 2022 - Halifax bank statement (from post)

Sponsor (Wife)

Aug 2020 - Startline Motor Finance Direct Debit letter for car financing
Jan 2021 - Halifax bank statement (post)
June 2021 - NHS letter
Oct 2021 - NHS letter
Jan 2022 - HMRC letter
May 2022 - Halifax bank statement (post)
Aug 2022 - Halifax bank letter

I've added a 7th piece of correspondence to my wife's list to ensure there aren't huge gaps and there are 3 strong sources (not sure how strong the Startline Finance is, so I wanted to put HMRC in there).

Thoughts? Thanks!

I am in a similar boat with needing to get this done ASAP. I took the next few days off work to work on this. My visa/BRP expires on the 9th of September. Still waiting on the employer letter from my husband's job and still waiting on a response to the mail documents in my own thread. I think yours looks okay, but I am hoping one of the more knowledgable visa experts gets back to us soon. 

Thanks for your reply, NorthBoston2London, and best of luck on getting your application done! An administrator on an FLR Facebook group said my correspondence looked okay, though it would be ideal if my wife's mail was spaced evenly and didn't require a seventh letter. I just realized that I could download Capital One credit card statements with our address for Aug. 2020 (I forgot she had this card because she rarely uses it and only gets e-statements) and also another month to even out the months, but I don't know if Capital One is any better than the auto finance company or if getting it evenly spaced is worth losing the HMRC letter over? The choices are basically seven letters including HMRC, or evenly spaced with Capital One instead of HMRC. Maybe I'm overthinking it.

Right now, I'm writing the employment letter for my wife's employer to sign for us tomorrow. Her direct supervisor, the HR head, and the CEO are all on site at her office, so I'm not sure who is best to have sign it.

It's amazing how nervous this process makes me even though I've done it once before. I think knowing my BRP expires in less than a week is just a reminder that the UK still has the right to chuck me out at will...and that's nerve-wracking. 

Thanks for your reply, NorthBoston2London, and best of luck on getting your application done! An administrator on an FLR Facebook group said my correspondence looked okay, though it would be ideal if my wife's mail was spaced evenly and didn't require a seventh letter. I just realized that I could download Capital One credit card statements with our address for Aug. 2020 (I forgot she had this card because she rarely uses it and only gets e-statements) and also another month to even out the months, but I don't know if Capital One is any better than the auto finance company or if getting it evenly spaced is worth losing the HMRC letter over? The choices are basically seven letters including HMRC, or evenly spaced with Capital One instead of HMRC. Maybe I'm overthinking it.

Right now, I'm writing the employment letter for my wife's employer to sign for us tomorrow. Her direct supervisor, the HR head, and the CEO are all on site at her office, so I'm not sure who is best to have sign it.

It's amazing how nervous this process makes me even though I've done it once before. I think knowing my BRP expires in less than a week is just a reminder that the UK still has the right to chuck me out at will...and that's nerve-wracking. 

Thanks, and good luck getting your application in! I think some people on here threw in some extra mail. I am thinking of doing so myself, as I have some tax documents, TV licence and water bill that were the "wrong" months. It probably couldn't hurt to use the HMRC document, Capital One and the auto finance company.

Thanks! I just paid my IHS fee and submitted my application today. My (free) bio appointment is 24 September. Now I just have to upload everything. I quadruple checked everything before hitting "submit," so I hope everything goes well.

Thanks! I just paid my IHS fee and submitted my application today. My (free) bio appointment is 24 September. Now I just have to upload everything. I quadruple checked everything before hitting "submit," so I hope everything goes well.

I've just read in another post that the mail can't be electronic; it's supposed to be mail that was physically posted to you that you scan. So, in that case, don't use the Capital One.

I've just read in another post that the mail can't be electronic; it's supposed to be mail that was physically posted to you that you scan. So, in that case, don't use the Capital One.

That’s correct - you cannot use any downloaded statements… everything needs to have been physically received in the mail in the month it was originally issued.

Because the entire point of the mail is to show you both were living in the house in those exact months… and therefore you were both there to receive the physical copies in person.

So online documents that have been downloaded cannot be used for the correspondence documents… because you could have online bank statements that are registered to a different address than where you actually live… which proves nothing in regards to meeting the cohabitation requirement.


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That's weird, because another forum swears that you can as long as your address is printed and the letter is dated. I assumed it had to be posted as well until they said you could use certain e-statements. Oh, well, I won't use anything from online. Good thing I haven't finished uploading my documents!

That's weird, because another forum swears that you can as long as your address is printed and the letter is dated. I assumed it had to be posted as well until they said you could use certain e-statements. Oh, well, I won't use anything from online. Good thing I haven't finished uploading my documents!

Sometimes people "get away with" something that is not correct according to the rules; providing online bank statements which have not been stamped or accompanied by a letter from the bank, for example. Because they got away with it, they start to advise other people that they can do it too. It doesn't mean it's correct, it just means they were lucky. Perhaps the next person won't be.

Just wanted to post an update saying that my FLRM application has been approved.

If anyone is interested, my timeline was:

31 Aug 2022: Submitted online application
4 Sept: BRP expired
7 Sept: Uploaded & submitted documents
24 Sept: Bio appointment (free, Croydon)
28 Sept: Approval email

Thanks for your help!

Awesome! Congratulations! I had my free biometric appointment today in Reading.

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Just wanted to post an update saying that my FLRM application has been approved.

If anyone is interested, my timeline was:

31 Aug 2022: Submitted online application
4 Sept: BRP expired
7 Sept: Uploaded & submitted documents
24 Sept: Bio appointment (free, Croydon)
28 Sept: Approval email

Thanks for your help!

Congratulations!