Forward Planning - UK citizen, US wife and US stepchild moving to UK

HI All,

First may I extend my thanks to all who post on here, I only recently starting reading and find the forum extremely helpful.

I am a UK citizen currently residing in the States. I have been married to my US wife for 6 years and by the time we plan to move to the UK, it will be 7 years. My stepdaughter is currently 16 but again, she'll be 17 by the time we see ourselves moving.

I am trying to look foward and plan accordingly, obviously rules and regulations could change in the meantime, but, it seems to me that if we have a general idea of anything we need to do, we can at least work towards that.

So, some random thoughts that came in to my mind;

Is the process made any easier because we have an established marriage or is it irrelevant?

Would we best to ensure we have our daughter complete the process well before she turns 18 or irrelevant?

Will I need to return to the UK first and create a base for us, this would not be cost effective, but?

I possibly have the option to stay with my current employer of 5 years, but transfer to the UK, would that do anything to ease the process, rather than finding a new position; I speak from a paperwork perspective, rather than a practical one.

How long, on average, would it be before my wife, or for that matter daughter, were to able work?

I have a stepson too, he is now 19. He is not currently thinking of moving at the same point that we do, but, would the process be more complicated because of his age?

Sorry for the wealth of questions and please, since I have gaping holes in my knowledge of UK to US immigration (I am well versed in the other direction and am a permanent Resident in the US), feel free to add anything you think I should consider.

Many thanks to all for taking the time to read this.

Cheers,

Mick

The one question I can answer (being at an American high school in London) and helping kids adjust:

I would wait for your step-daughter to finish high school...and if not, then at least send her to an American school over here.  She'd have a VERY tough time with going to a Brit school at this point (almost impossible & may have to do an extra year to do it).  Or see if she'd want to do a one year boarding school program in the States.  But it's very tough for a youngster to leave during their last year of high school - friends, teachers who know them (college recs potential), keeping on the same track, being new in a school when there are so few new kids.  It takes an amazing child to adjust to that move at that time - personally I wouldn't do it to them unless they were totally excited about it and not feeling pressured to be excited about it.

Because you have been married for more than 4 years it means that your wife will apply for Indefinite Leave to Enter, which confers upon her permanent residency immediately.

If your daughter is in full time education (or plans to be), is wholly financially dependent upon you and your wife, will be living with you (or in student accommodation) and does not have a family of her won, then the dependent issue only gets tricky once she passes the age of 19. This is also true of your stepson.

You can come to the UK first or travel with them, it doesn't really matter.

From a paperwork perspective, I guess the job issue doesn't matter a huge amount.



Victoria

The one question I can answer (being at an American high school in London) and helping kids adjust:

I would wait for your step-daughter to finish high school...and if not, then at least send her to an American school over here.  She'd have a VERY tough time with going to a Brit school at this point (almost impossible & may have to do an extra year to do it).  Or see if she'd want to do a one year boarding school program in the States.  But it's very tough for a youngster to leave during their last year of high school - friends, teachers who know them (college recs potential), keeping on the same track, being new in a school when there are so few new kids.  It takes an amazing child to adjust to that move at that time - personally I wouldn't do it to them unless they were totally excited about it and not feeling pressured to be excited about it.

Thank you!!

It's been our intention to let her finish school here before the move, simply because we feel it would be too disruptive at a fairly critical time.

She is very enthused about the whole idea of moving and wants to do her studies for Nursing in the UK, we will see but she has been keen on this for some time.

Again, thank you for your input.

Mick

Because you have been married for more than 4 years it means that your wife will apply for Indefinite Leave to Enter, which confers upon her permanent residency immediately.

If your daughter is in full time education (or plans to be), is wholly financially dependent upon you and your wife, will be living with you (or in student accommodation) and does not have a family of her won, then the dependent issue only gets tricky once she passes the age of 19. This is also true of your stepson.

You can come to the UK first or travel with them, it doesn't really matter.

From a paperwork perspective, I guess the job issue doesn't matter a huge amount.



Victoria

Victoria, thank you so much for your informative post.

I apologise for the delay in replying, I've been on some rather strong pain killers and the chance of making sense seemed even more remote than usual

I'm sure I have a few questions as a result of your advice and certainly more reseach to do, but the one thing which imediately comes to mind is this;

In applying for this Indefinite leave, do we (or in fact must we) have the chance to do this prior to any physical move to the UK? Or do we move and then file? The former sounds more appealing and if that is the way we can or have to do it, how long before the actual move could we file?

We're going to be in the UK for a week later this year should we be thinking in terms of trying to do something which requires our presence at that point?

Hope I haven't rambled too much and once again, many thanks.

Kind regards,

Mick

In applying for this Indefinite leave, do we (or in fact must we) have the chance to do this prior to any physical move to the UK? Or do we move and then file? The former sounds more appealing and if that is the way we can or have to do it, how long before the actual move could we file?

You (meaning your wife) must apply for ILE from the US.  You need it before you move. 

And mine took about a week start to finish.