help with evidence for ILR please :) HELP WITH BANK STATEMENTS PLEASE

Hiya,

husband got to UK on 3rd July 2017 on a spouse visa, and is on the 5 year route, as we got our last visa on 28th Jan 2020. So we will be applying on 6th June 2022 for his ILR.

Just wondering if you would mind looking at the following list and letting me know if this is sufficient. Do we need to include affidavits of support from friends and family to verify our relationship?

- Water bill APRIL 2019 (both names)
- October 2019 Bank Statement (both names)
- COUNCIL TAX BILL MARCH 2019-20 (Both names)


- Bank statement MAY 2020 (both names)
- WATER BILL OCT 2020 (both names)
- Council tax bill MARCH 2020 (both names)


- Water Bill  SEPT 2021 (both names)
- BT Bill  FEB 2021 (one name)
- PHONE BILL MAY 2021 (one name)
- Bank Statement JULY 2021 (both names)


- BT bill FEB 2022 (one name)
- Phone Bill MARCH 2022 (one name)
- SO Energy Bill  MAY 2022 (both names)
- Council tax Bill  MARCH 2022-23 (both names)

- Letter from letting agency, confirming how long we have lived at address
- Current lease agreement

- Letter from Chads employer, confirming how long he has worked there and annual income.
- Letter confirming authenticity of Pay stubs
- Pay stubs from OCT 2021 - MAY 2022
- Contract of employment

- Bank statements for last 7 months

- marriage license
- Birth certificates for myself and husband
- Passport copies
- Kids birth certificates and passport copies

- LIFE IN UK PASS NUMBER 

Please let me know if im missing anything vital. Thanks in advance for help

Do we need to include affidavits of support from friends and family to verify our relationship?

No, letters of support from anyone other than your spouse cannot be considered and will not even be looked at (this is the same as for the spousal visa and FLR).

For the cohabitation documents you need to go back 2.5 years, with 1 document in each name dated every 5 months.

So, if applying early June 2022 you will need documents from each of the following months:

November 2019
April 2020
September 2020
February 2021
July 2021
December 2021
May 2022

For the accommodation, requirement you do need to include your 2022/2023 Council tax statement… this is separate to the cohabitation requirement and is to show monthly housing expenses

You do not need:
- Birth certificates for myself and husband…

These are not required for any visa because your passports are your proof of ID. You only include birth certificates if you do not have a  valid passport… and in that case, there are a number of other documents that must also be included.


From what I can see, you are missing:
- letter(s) dated in the last 3 months confirming each child’s address (from their GP or school)
- your husband’s BRP card
- May 2022 P60 (which should be issued by May 31st - I just got mine yesterday)


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Thanks for taking the time to respond. I will sort letters out to match those dates.

Quick follow up:

The letters confirming address for the children? Is this a must? as they dont attend school (homeschooled) and they havent had any letters from GP's in recent months, as they are rarely unwell. Is there anything you suggest we ask for? They are all UK citizens. I wasnt aware I needed to prove their address :/ panicking slightly now.

P60, my husband still works for the US company that he did before we moved here. They just pay him through a UK entity. They have never sent him a P60 in the last 5 years. Is getting the information from somewhere else sufficient? Or does it have to be the P60. Im nervous they will say they dont have one.

Thanks for taking the time to respond. I will sort letters out to match those dates.

Quick follow up:

The letters confirming address for the children? Is this a must? as they dont attend school (homeschooled) and they havent had any letters from GP's in recent months, as they are rarely unwell. Is there anything you suggest we ask for? They are all UK citizens. I wasnt aware I needed to prove their address :/ panicking slightly now.

Yes, it’s a requirement to provide a letter confirming address. If you don’t send one, they will likely contact you to ask for it.

Most people are end up having to request a specific letter from their GP, which they may charge for.

[quote{P60, my husband still works for the US company that he did before we moved here. They just pay him through a UK entity. They have never sent him a P60 in the last 5 years. Is getting the information from somewhere else sufficient? Or does it have to be the P60. Im nervous they will say they dont have one.
[/quote]

No need to worry.

The P60 is not a required document, it’s only optional. We recommend sending it because they could ask for it, but if you don’t have one, don’t worry about it.


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Thanks. We actually did find his latest P60 so will include it anyway.

So just incase GP is funny about doing a letter. (they are sometimes weird when you request things) Would the following be accepted?

Daughter 1
- glasses prescription (which include DOB, name address and is dated in last 3 months) and  accompanying letter from specs savers on letter head confirming current prescription is the most up to date

Daughter 2
- Letter from private dentist that we attend addressed to her with a dental plan and confirming recent visit (on their official letter head)

Son
- letter from hospital allergy department, confirming his next appointment

I am within a few weeks of your husband’s  timeline and also have 3 UKC / USC kids - this is the first I’ve heard of them needing mail as well! It wasn’t on the list that my application has churned out. Is this new @ksand24  ? Thanks so much to you both - sorry to jump on but it helps me to double check against you since we are in such similar situations / timelines!

no problem! its so stressful isnt it. haha. i wish id known earlier. So glad for this forum.. or i wouldnt have known! My GP said they dont really know which letter they could create for them. So struggling a bit to find something.

I am within a few weeks of your husband’s  timeline and also have 3 UKC / USC kids - this is the first I’ve heard of them needing mail as well! It wasn’t on the list that my application has churned out. Is this new @ksand24  ? Thanks so much to you both - sorry to jump on but it helps me to double check against you since we are in such similar situations / timelines!

It’s been required for ILR for about 5 years, maybe longer, and for FLR for about 3 or 4 years.

I remember it was listed as a required document on the 2018 paper ILR form, and then they started requiring it for FLR as well a year or two later, once they switched to online forms.

I also remember someone applying early last year, I think, and they didn’t include a letter (because it wasn’t listed on the document list) and UKVI contacted her during the visa processing asking for her to provide one.

It’s also worth being aware that the document list provided by the online form is a bit vague and often does not include all the required documents.


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Thanks. We actually did find his latest P60 so will include it anyway.

So just incase GP is funny about doing a letter. (they are sometimes weird when you request things) Would the following be accepted?

Daughter 1
- glasses prescription (which include DOB, name address and is dated in last 3 months) and  accompanying letter from specs savers on letter head confirming current prescription is the most up to date

Daughter 2
- Letter from private dentist that we attend addressed to her with a dental plan and confirming recent visit (on their official letter head)

Son
- letter from hospital allergy department, confirming his next appointment

As long as they’re all dated in the last 3 months, those should all fine be to use, so there’ll be no need to get any letters from the GP… which is good, since GPs have been known to charge about £25 per letter!

The letters just need to be something official that confirms the address on file for the children.


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Ah perfect! I think we should be able to submit what we have. Hopefully can get a letter from the dentist for all of them anyway, so hopefully that is enough! Thanks for all of your help really appreciate it!

So BANK STATEMENTS!

sorry for all the questions, but this is the first time we are applying without a lawyer and want to make sure we get this right. @ksand24

We have currently

- STAMPED "account transaction details" back to 3rd DEC 2021. (6 Months). However even though its a joint account, its only showing my name on the transaction list and not my husbands (the applicant) is this a problem?

- Natwest have said they can send me 7 months worth of transactions through the post, on Natwest letterhead, but these will not be stamped, but are technically official but I feel like they may just be similar to what can be downloaded online.

- I will need to go back into Natwest, after pay day to get the remaining transaction details, to include mays pay day.

- Will they accept downloaded online statements as proof of address to go with mail submitted? As we don't have mail/BILLS on the exact months that you listed earlier. for example, we have something from 0CT 2019, but not NOV 2019. So we have more than we need, but they arent all exactly 5 months apart like you listed. but off by a month or two.

We have currently

- STAMPED "account transaction details" back to 3rd DEC 2021. (6 Months). However even though its a joint account, its only showing my name on the transaction list and not my husbands (the applicant) is this a problem?

No, that’s not a problem.

Bank statements for the financial requirement can be in:
EITHER
- your name only
OR
- his name only
OR
- both your names

- Natwest have said they can send me 7 months worth of transactions through the post, on Natwest letterhead, but these will not be stamped, but are technically official but I feel like they may just be similar to what can be downloaded online.

If they have been received in the post, they are considered official and do NOT need to be stamped

- Will they accept downloaded online statements as proof of address to go with mail submitted? As we don't have mail/BILLS on the exact months that you listed earlier. for example, we have something from 0CT 2019, but not NOV 2019. So we have more than we need, but they arent all exactly 5 months apart like you listed. but off by a month or two.

No, ALL cohabitation documents MUST have been received in the mail in the months they are dated. This is to prove you were physically living in the house at the time they were mailed and were home to receive them in person.

If you cannot provide documents from the exact months I listed, you can include the ones from slightly different months, but you MUST also include a written explanation for why you do not have mail from the correct months.


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Oh dear @ksand24  Now I'm really stressed. A lot of our bills are online/were switched to online without our knowledge. So we have plenty of things addressed to us, but the only downloadable online, such as internet bill, and phone bills etc. I assume these would not count?

Is there any particular wording you would put in the letter to explain why we don't have them?

We arrived in the country on 3rd July 2017
My husbands last visa was was submitted and approved  on 3rd January 2020 (this visa expires on 22nd August 2022)

We plan to submit his application on 6th June 2022 for ILR

This is the evidence that was received physically through the post:

- 31st august 2019 DVLA vehicle tax reminder (applicant listed)
- 2nd april 2020 water bill (both names listed)
 - 8th sept 2020 letter from hospital (spouse listed)
- 13th march 2020 council tax bill (both names listed)
- 31st december 2021 HMRC self assessment tax calculation (applicant listed)
- 11th March 2022 council tax bill (both names listed)

I am panicking as we barely have anything physically through the post.
Sorry... thanks for your help. Do you think we need to get a lawyer to help us? as it seems we have messed up with the mail.

Oh dear @ksand24  Now I'm really stressed. A lot of our bills are online/were switched to online without our knowledge. So we have plenty of things addressed to us, but the only downloadable online, such as internet bill, and phone bills etc. I assume these would not count?

No, unfortunately not. The reason being that you could have online bills registered to any address, without you actually living at that address… so they don’t actually prove cohabitation.

We do recommend that you turn off paperless billing for everything as soon as you arrive in the UK (and also keep checking to make sure they haven’t switched you to paperless without telling you) so that you don’t have this issue when it comes to applying for your visas.

Is there any particular wording you would put in the letter to explain why we don't have them?

Nope, you just tell the truth.

For example:
“For my cohabitation documents, I am providing X document dated in October 2020 instead of November 2020 because I did not receive any suitable mail in the post in November 2020.”

I am panicking as we barely have anything physically through the post.
Sorry... thanks for your help. Do you think we need to get a lawyer to help us? as it seems we have messed up with the mail.

No need to panic - just provide whatever you do have and then all you need to do is explain in a letter the reason for not having the right months. As long as you do that, it shouldn’t be an issue and won’t affect the visa decision.

There is absolutely no reason why you would need to use a lawyer.

Lawyers are only needed for complicated applications involving:
- serious criminal convictions
- multiple refused visas/entries to the UK in the past
- previous illegal overstaying in the UK
- previous illegal working in the UK


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Thanks so much for your help I promise I only have a couple more questions @ksand24

So we have received some bank statements through the post during this time from natwest, however they are the little a5 sized ones, and they include a names and address, but they don’t have a date on them apart from “summary 18 NOV 2021 to 17 DEC 2021” date of the statement
Would any of these work?

This is our final letter/list. Is this appropriate?

To whom it may concern,

For our cohabitation documents, I believe we needed to provide mail from the following months:

November 2019
April 2020
September 2020
February 2021
July 2021
December 2021
May 2022

Please note that some of the correspondence provided is not exactly 5 months apart, as we did not receive suitable mail during some of the months listed above.

However we do believe that this list below is sufficient evidence that we have lived together continually since our last visa was issued, and have done so since we were married in 2014.

We have instead provided the following:

- COUNCIL TAX 13th March 2019 (in place of November 2019) JOINT
Northumbrian Water 4th April 2019 (in place of November 2019) JOINT

- Northumbrian Water 2nd April 2020 JOINT

 - Northumbrian Water 1st October 2020 (In place of September 2020) JOINT
NHS Letter 8th September 2020  SPOUSE NAME LISTED ON LETTER 

- Private Medical Consultant invoice 15th January 2021 (In place of February 2021) SPOUSE NAME LISTED ON LETTER 
HMRC (Tax calculation) 16th January 2021 (In place of February 2021) APPLICANT NAME ONLY

- DBS check 17th October 2021 (In place of July 2021) SPOUSE NAME LISTED ON LETTER 
DVLA  (tax reminder) 31st August 2021 (in place of July 2021) APPLICANT NAME ONLY

- Bank Statement from Natwest Summary date 17th Nov - 17th DEC 2021 (in place of dec 2021) JOINT

- Council TAX 11th March 2022 (in place of May 2022)  JOINT However we might still be able to get something from May 2022