Departing from Dublin and Arriving back into Belfast...Will this be an issue?

I have gotten my spouse visa! Yay! I plan to enter the country into UK via Belfast to collect my BRP. However, I plan to make this a short trip due to needing to go back to the US to finish up some commitments/goodbyes. I wanted to know when I'm flying BACK to the US, does it matter if I fly OUT of Dublin instead of Belfast? Or will this present issue when I re-enter the UK via Belfast in 2.5 weeks time?

I have gotten my spouse visa! Yay! I plan to enter the country into UK via Belfast to collect my BRP. However, I plan to make this a short trip due to needing to go back to the US to finish up some commitments/goodbyes. I wanted to know when I'm flying BACK to the US, does it matter if I fly OUT of Dublin instead of Belfast? Or will this present issue when I re-enter the UK via Belfast in 2.5 weeks time?

First, for your entry, are you flying direct to Belfast, or connecting somewhere along the way?  I'm not sure if they're stamping vignettes anymore, but you don't want to enter for the first time via Dublin because there won't be a record of your entry to the UK if you come through Dublin (Ireland and the UK are in a common travel area so there is presently no border control between them, so there would be record of you entering Ireland, but not the UK).

As for flying out, once you've made your initial entry to the UK and established the start of your five years, where you fly from doesn't matter.  It's just for the first entry that it matters.

You fly out on your American passport so no matter where you fly from when you return to the US.

The plan for first trip on the spouse vignette/visa is to fly into from USA to Belfast via Manchester, so the initial entry will be into the UK - no problems there.

We were more concerned about either of 2 different scenarios, for travel after the initial visa/vignette trip:

(1) Travel from Northern Ireland to Republic of Ireland (border free) and then depart from Dublin airport to overseas and return to Dublin.
(2) Depart from UK airport to overseas, and return flight to Dublin.

Does the Common Travel Agreement include for non-EEA citizens who hold a UK visa? Can getting a 30 day visa stamp from Dublin to enter ROI (only for travel onward to Belfast/UK) come back to bite us, as the 30 days will expire? Or does the Irish customs/border control at the airport acknowledge the CTA and simply not stamp your passport?

I hope I've made it clear  Thanks so much for any help!!

After the first entry into the U.K., there are no issues with travelling through Ireland at all. So, just do what you like and don’t worry about it.


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Fantastic news, thanks a million!!