How many days outside the UK can I have on a spousal visa?

I have been trying to figure this out. My visa was issued May 16 2014, but we didn't enter the UK until August 18th 2014. (house wouldn't sell!) I have had a couple of holidays back to the US, about 3 weeks worth. My former employer has offered me some freelance work for a month, which I would love to do as it pays well, but I don't know if I can be out of the UK for that long and still have enough time in the UK to qualify for my FLR which is the next step. My Visa expires February 18th 2017. Can anyone tell me what the minimum number of days I need to be in the UK in order to get my FLR? Do days out of the UK but in Europe count?

There is no minimum number of days - you can be out of the UK as much as you like, however you must be able to show you have lived with your spouse for the entire time... So if you go back to the US for a long period your spouse would ideally need go with you to show you were living together the whole time - it depends how long you would be gone though, a few weeks would probably be okay on your own but if it was a few months, UKVI could decide that you weren't meeting the terms of your visa (I.e. permanently living with your spouse in the UK).

You won't qualify to apply for FLR(M) until 28 days before you reach 30 months from your first entry to the UK as a spouse. If you entered on 18th August 2014, you won't reach 30 months until 18th Feb 2017 (the expiry date of your visa) so you can't apply for FLR(M) until 21st January 2017 or later. You're lucky you didn't leave it any later to enter the UK - another month and you might have needed to apply for an extra FLR(M) visa to qualify for ILR.


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To note though that for UK citizenship you cannot have been outside the UK for more than 270 days (9 months) in the last 3 years before applying, with no more of 90 of those days in the final 12 months.

So assuming you are eligible for citizenship around August 2019, you can't be out of the UK for more than 9 months from August 2016 onwards.


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To note though that for UK citizenship you cannot have been outside the UK for more than 270 days (9 months) in the last 3 years before applying, with no more of 90 of those days in the final 12 months.

So assuming you are eligible for citizenship around August 2019, you can't be out of the UK for more than 9 months from August 2016 onwards. If you are out of the UK longer, you would just need to wait to apply for citizenship until you were below the 270 days (the days you left and came back to the UK don't count).


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