Probbaly a daft question, fiancee visa dates

We're trying to decide more or less when my fiancee will move to the UK. The wedding is Febuary 2006.
I know we have 6 months to get married, but I'm a little unclear when that starts and ends.

First of all, am I correct in thinking the 6 months starts when the visa is issued and not when she enters the UK?

Secondly, do we actully have 6 months to get married or 6 months to apply for FLR? In other words to we have to allow for time after the wedding to apply for FLR within 6 months from when she gets the fiancee visa.

Thanks

Your fiancee' visa is valid for six months. It begins with the date stamped on the visa. You can request to have it post dated by a couple of months when you reply--- just be forewarned that was my plan but in the midst of gathering all the other information I forgot to make this simple request! Luckily It still gave me six months just not much extra time after the wedding. You don't need much time after the wedding-- once you apply for your FLR your fiancee visa is automatically valid while they consider your next application, and remember that your fiancee can't work until the FLR so most people are anxious to get one as soon as possible.

Hope that helped some--- Good Luck

Helena

Not daft at all, slices!  HG's response seems pretty thorough.  My hubby & I ran into problems with this when I was moving over here to England, and we didn't have as much info to work with as HG has provided.

We applied for the fiancee visa mid-Feb in 2004 & I guess we somehow assumed they would do it based on the date we filled in the 'when will you be entering the UK' question (something to that effect). I was not moving over until March 28.  Since it seemed we had a 6-month window for the marriage to take place, my DH made initial preparations on this end by reserving a Sept 25 date in the Harrogate register office. Of course, all of this ended up being a right palaver!  We had selected the Sept 25 date as it had some correlations to both of our parents' weddings and so it was meant to have some additional personal & sentimental significance, etc.  When I received the visa, it was -- of course -- immediately dated for Feb 19th!  Which meant it expired on Aug 19th -- about a month & a week before our wedding was scheduled!

We went to see an immigration advisor after I got over here to see what our chances would be of having the visa extended so that we could stick to our originally scheduled wedding date. The advisor basically told us that it's just not done, so that completely discouraged our original plans.  Phooey!  By that time, there were NO decent marriage ceremony appointments available at the Harrogate register office (only times were weird weekday times).  We live in Leeds Council area so I called our local office instead - same thing!  I began calling around at licenced, approved civil ceremony venues...eventually we lucked out!  A lovely small local hotel (country house style) had just had a wedding party/ceremony cancellation for Saturday, August 14th!  We grabbed the date -- couldn't believe our luck because it was like July 1st by that time!

We posted the FLR app in on the Monday right after the wedding -- 3 days before expiration! It took them about a month as I recall to process it & return the FLR to us.  Of course, we had to postpone making any honeymoon plans until we received the FLR (and our passports) back from them.  Had a lovely trip to Spain afterwards, in October.

Thanks for the responses, not sure if we'll apply in person for FLR or by post.  We've decided to honeymoon in the UK to avoid any problems with not having passports. Although it's going to be cold here in Febuary.

Post is notably cheaper -- if you can wait for it (vs same day service by showing up in person).  February honeymoon -- maybe hide away in a cozy hotel somewheres (open fireplace? etc) or a city break (London? Edinburgh?).

We were thinking of hirng a cottage somewhere, we were thinkking along the open fireplace lines. Although the diffrence being I'd spend hours trying to get it to light.

Well if you are having difficulty getting it to light & it's too cold -- all the more reason to stay in bed.