Final Document Check with Questions

First, let me say THANK YOU to this forum. My husband and I were so lost before we found this site and it has been a tremendous help.

My husband and I met seven years ago in an abroad program and remained long distance for those seven years traveling back and forth from US to UK. We finally got married this Summer and I was back with him in the UK getting settled and trying to enjoy married life as much as we could. I am now back in the states finalizing my settlement visa application and am just nervous (as I am sure everyone is!) that I will get rejected and be forced to be separated from my husband for even longer (oh... and pay the $3600 again..)

I have my biometric appointment tomorrow and hope to submit application and documents on Friday and was hoping to get a little piece of mind on a documents check (some questions included). NOTE: We are on the Category A for Financial Requirements

Sponsor Documents

Sponsor Cover Letter
Sponsorship Undertaking Form
Copy of Passport including stamped pages (QUESTION: Do these need to be certified copies? Also, he moved house and can't find his old passport, what do we do?)
Copy of ESTA
Original Long Form Birth Certificate
Original Letter from Employer
Original Pay Stubs (10 months)
Stamped Bank Statements (7 Months)
P60 Form April 2017
Tenancy Agreement (QUESTION: We have an email from the estate agent (they manage the property) stating that I can be added to the agreement once I get my visa. Is this sufficient or should we have a signed letter from the landlord?)
Water bill as proof of address

Applicant Documents

(QUESTION: Should I include a cover letter listing my documents?)
Application
(to come) Biometrics
Appendix 2 (QUESTION: In section 3.3 is it worth it to list more than one source to meet financial requirement? Husband meets the threshold, but just want to be safe since I have some investments that may help support our case. Also, they are investments and not cash savings... does that count?)
Marriage License
12 Months of Bank Statements
Travel Conformation emails (not boarding passes) at least 2 for the past 7 years for both of us (QUESTION: I dont have boarding passes, are the travel conformation enough?)
7 Years worth of emails (including screenshot of all emails sent with subject and date)
Four physical cards from my Husband to me
U.S. Sized Passport Photos
Previous Passport
3 Photographs (including one from wedding)
Charles Schwab Investment Statement

Am I missing anything??

This has to be the top 5 scariest things I have ever done (planning a wedding was somehow less stressful!) so all your help and input is much appreciated!

Welcome to the forum .

You DON'T need the following documents, so take them all out:
- Sponsorship Undertaking Form (not required for a spousal visa)
- Copy of sponsor's Passport including stamped pages (only the photo page is needed)
- Copy of ESTA
- sponsor's Original Long Form Birth Certificate
- 10 months of paystubs (only 6 months will be considered)
- Water bill as proof of address
- applicant: 12 Months of Bank Statements (cannot be considered)
- Charles Schwab Investment Statement (irrelevant to visa application)

To answer your questions:
- your husband's passport copy does not need to be certified.
- you do not need your husband's old passport anyway... it's irrelevant
- you really need a wet signature letter from the landlord giving you permission to live there - you might be okay with an emailed letter if it's the only thing you can get, but if you can get an original, that would be best (if you need to wait for it to arrive, you can always reschedule your biometrics... as you only have 5 days from biometrics to mail the documents to Sheffield. Also, if you needed to cancel the application for any reason, you can only get a refund if you have not yet attended biometrics)
- it's a good idea to include a content letter at the beginning listing the documents in the package
- No, if you meet Category A, you do NOT need to include any other categories. Savings will only be considered if they are above £16,000 and then on top of that you need 2.5 times the difference between his salary and £18,600, if he makes LESS than £18,600. Also, they must be immediately accessible in cash
- boarding passes are best, but if you don't have them you can use flight tickets

_________________________________________________ _____________________


So, a revised list of what you need (additions in red):

Applicant Documents
- Settlement Priority processing receipt (if purchasing)
- Printed online application
- Completed Appendix 2
- Stamped biometrics receipt
- IHS surcharge payment receipt
- Current passport
- Previous Passport
- U.S. Sized Passport Photos
- return shipping label (can be purchased from VFS Global

Sponsor Documents
- Sponsor Cover Letter
- copy of sponsor's current passport photo page

Finances
Mandatory
- 6 full months (not 10 months) of original payslips showing at least £1,550 before tax on each one, the latest dated in the last 28 days
- 6 full months of original bank statements showing the deposit of every single payslips, the latest dated in the last 28 days
- Original Letter from Employer dated in the last 28 days
Optional but recommended
- P60 Form April 2017
- original job contract

Accommodation
- Tenancy Agreement
- original wet signature letter from landlord giving you permission to live there

Relationship
- Marriage Certificate (not marriage licence... the licence is what you get BEFORE you get married)
- 3 Photographs (including one from wedding)
- Travel Confirmation emails for past 7 years
- Four physical cards from my Husband to me
- 7 Years worth of emails (including screenshot of all emails sent with subject and date) (no more than 1-2 pages in total... just showing maybe 6 to 8 emails per year. No email content should be included)

Amazing! This is so helpful, thank you.

A few follow up questions:

1. On my email from for the biometric appointment it says I have 2 weeks to submit, is that  not the case? Probably wouldn't take the full time, but would nice to have the wiggle room.

2. The last pay stub is from 30th of November... we will be off by like 3 days, will this make a huge difference? If so I can cancel my appointment, but would hate to have to push this off.

3. We emailed our landlord about a letter and would most probably be a PDF letter. Again, if a wet signature is super important we can see if they can send it here and reschedule my appointment.

4. One thing I forgot to ask is that I made a really stupid mistake on my application (should have checked here first) and put my husbands parents name under the "family" option. Should I cancel my application? I think I read somewhere here that you can just note it on the paper application, does that work?

Such a hard balance between wanting to get this done ASAP and not wanting to get reject for a dumb mistake so thanks for your guidance!

No problem.

For the follow up questions:

1. No, the email is out of date - for US applicants it changed from 2 weeks to 5 days in September 2015. See here for instructions for US applicants (updated June 2017):
 https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/usa-apply-for-a-uk-visa/apply-for-a-uk-visa-in-the-usa#post-your-application

2. It’s 28 days before the date you submitted and paid for the online application.

3. All documents should be original or certified copies - so a wet signature is really needed for it to be original (a PDF copy could be forged)

4. No, just correct it in pen on the printed form and make a note of the mistake. This happens a lot - the online application is not clear that it’s the applicant’s parents’ information that is needed (to confirm you are not already a UK citizen).


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OK great thanks! I cancelled my appointment today and will reschedule for next week as the property manager is on holiday through the 2nd.

Do you know if there a maximum amount of time that you have to complete biometrics from when you submit your application? I didn't see anything online. I submitted mine on Monday and hope to have the biometrics done by this time next week.

Thanks again for your help.

It used to be that you had to get the application and documents to Sheffield within 30 days of applying online or 14 days from biometrics, whichever was sooner... but then in 2015, it changed to 5 days from biometrics and they deleted the ‘30 days from applying online’ part.

So, I think you’re fine as long as you mail the documents within the 5 days of biometrics.


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Thank you so much! This is great. Final question ( I think...)

My husband temporarily moved house while his was being redone. He didn't change his address at the bank, but did have the pay stubs going to his temporary address so he could collect them, so there is a bit of a conflict of information.

His bank statements reflect the receipt of monthly payments as listed on his pay stub, but the address is his home address, not the temporary one.

Should we note this in his letter just to mitigate any confusion? Or do you think it will be OK as the payment amount and dates on the pay stubs matches what's in his bank account?