Non-priority Spousal Visa Timeline

Hi All,

Thought I would give you an update after a relatively informative call with the UKVI call centre.

According to them, due to their own internal processes, once the applications are sent to Sheffield on some occasions people will get an acknowledgment email and some may not, this makes no difference.

Having enquired about our case the person on the phone confirmed that all has been received by Sheffield, but the only emails we will be getting are the decision emails once it has been processed.

According to their current non priority timeline for US Citizens they have advised between 2 to 2.5 months for processing.

The person was also informative enough to open a case ID during the call in case any further enquiries are to be made of a similar nature.

I know most people have not had the best experiences with the call centre, however, I thought I would give an update after my call a few minutes ago.

Thanks,

J2j

I hope that the information you were given turns out to be correct. There does seem to be faster processing of priority now than in April and May. Based on the current non-priority timeline evidence that people have logged here, it is much more like 3 months and I understand this has sometimes been considerably longer over summer period, but hopefully they have increased the staffing. The helpline person was also 'helpful' when I phoned two months ago. They confirmed the address we had sent the application to was correct and agreed to escalate our case due to an email being sent to us three weeks after submission to say they had not received our documents. They said we would receive an email following this escalation. That was beginning of June. There was no follow up at all. However, helpline was freshly taken over then, and it sounds like they may be improving things if they are able to at least confirm your application is received. I would still treat the information they give you with caution.

Hi All,

Thought I would give you an update after a relatively informative call with the UKVI call centre.

According to them, due to their own internal processes, once the applications are sent to Sheffield on some occasions people will get an acknowledgment email and some may not, this makes no difference.

Having enquired about our case the person on the phone confirmed that all has been received by Sheffield, but the only emails we will be getting are the decision emails once it has been processed.

According to their current non priority timeline for US Citizens they have advised between 2 to 2.5 months for processing.

The person was also informative enough to open a case ID during the call in case any further enquiries are to be made of a similar nature.

I know most people have not had the best experiences with the call centre, however, I thought I would give an update after my call a few minutes ago.

Thanks,

J2j

The call centre has standard lines for individuals like:
"Escalating to the home office."
"Opening a case file."
"Being processed."
"A decision is being made."

and standard lines for MPs like:
"It was not a straightforward application."
"Some documents were missing." (always b/s).

In the plethora of threads on this forum we haven't seen a shred of evidence to show these are anything but lip-service designed to blow the caller off.
Calling has never affected or sped up the processing time or produced any useful tangible information pertaining to the callers application.
The call centre is as useful as a chocolate teapot...

I should listen to my own advice... I've called three times, it's a bit like the movie Inception: a call within a call within a call.

I hope that the information you were given turns out to be correct.

If it does, it will be purely by coincidence. Anything they say is just intended to appease the caller.

The call centre has standard lines for individuals like:
"Escalating to the home office."
"Opening a case file."
"Being processed."
"A decision is being made."

and standard lines for MPs like:
"It was not a straightforward application."
"Some documents were missing." (always b/s).

In the plethora of threads on this forum we haven't seen a shred of evidence to show these are anything but lip-service designed to blow the caller off.
Calling has never made affected or sped up the processing time or produced any useful tangible information pertaining to the callers application.
The call centre is as useful as a chocolate teapot...

I should listen to my own advice... I've called three times, it's a bit like the movie Inception: a call within a call within a call.

You have cracked the code! 

Hey guys , possibly asking the question again though last time you guys cleared it , but this time with more clarity and clear dates .

So the vignette starts in my passport from 25th July to 24 Aug and am landing UK on 21st Aug morning . So I can collect my BRP between 21-24 th Aug that's correct ?
Reason for clarifying is the confusion about the way they write the letter . I have to stay till as much late as possible in Aug for my job notice period to work out and obviously UKVI sent vignette so late than I planned and instead starting my visa from 1st Aug they chose 7 days advance , so all delayed .
Well thought a lot of you might be travelling now and can confirm my idea about the BRP collection date
Many thanks again

Hey guys , possibly asking the question again though last time you guys cleared it , but this time with more clarity and clear dates .

So the vignette starts in my passport from 25th July to 24 Aug and am landing UK on 21st Aug morning . So I can collect my BRP between 21-24 th Aug that's correct ?
Reason for clarifying is the confusion about the way they write the letter . I have to stay till as much late as possible in Aug for my job notice period to work out and obviously UKVI sent vignette so late than I planned and instead starting my visa from 1st Aug they chose 7 days advance , so all delayed .
Well thought a lot of you might be travelling now and can confirm my idea about the BRP collection date
Many thanks again

My understanding is that it is 10 days from when you enter the UK...

Hey guys , possibly asking the question again though last time you guys cleared it , but this time with more clarity and clear dates .

So the vignette starts in my passport from 25th July to 24 Aug and am landing UK on 21st Aug morning . So I can collect my BRP between 21-24 th Aug that's correct ?
Reason for clarifying is the confusion about the way they write the letter . I have to stay till as much late as possible in Aug for my job notice period to work out and obviously UKVI sent vignette so late than I planned and instead starting my visa from 1st Aug they chose 7 days advance , so all delayed .
Well thought a lot of you might be travelling now and can confirm my idea about the BRP collection date
Many thanks again

You must do this before your vignette expires or within 10 days of arriving in the UK, whichever is later. 

https://www.gov.uk/biometric-residence-permits/collect

Hi All,

I was wondering if anyone could shed any light on this.
Am I right in assuming that they have different "units" at UKVI Sheffield which process applications dependent on country of applicant?

I can see that there seems to be a variance in timelines between say those applying from the US, or India, or the middle east with different processing times... I would only assume that there is a separate unit for US only applications?

Additionally, having had a quick look at the spreadsheet, I can see that the last NP decision/approval was sent on 8th July 2017... and we have not seen any activity for NP applicants so far... would be good to hear updates from those that have also received any decisions after this date to help understand the time frames.

Last question, does anyone know when the .gov websites are updated with the new processing times, as the last updates seem to be in May 2017, so is it every 3 months they update the stats or every month?

Thanks,

j2j

Hi All,

I was wondering if anyone could shed any light on this.
Am I right in assuming that they have different "units" at UKVI Sheffield which process applications dependent on country of applicant?

I can see that there seems to be a variance in timelines between say those applying from the US, or India, or the middle east with different processing times... I would only assume that there is a separate unit for US only applications?

Additionally, having had a quick look at the spreadsheet, I can see that the last NP decision/approval was sent on 8th July 2017... and we have not seen any activity for NP applicants so far... would be good to hear updates from those that have also received any decisions after this date to help understand the time frames.

Last question, does anyone know when the .gov websites are updated with the new processing times, as the last updates seem to be in May 2017, so is it every 3 months they update the stats or every month?

Thanks,

j2j

I believe there were a lot of countries that were previously not processed at Sheffield that were recently moved to Sheffield. I think out of country US applications were also moved to Sheffield a few years back. I am not sure anyone knows for a fact how the teams are organised, but the processing times are certainly recorded and published as distinct for different countries.

I think the processing times tool is relatively new. I believe there was one in November and one in February before May so yes seems to be about quarterly. It's quite a skewed tool - see recent discussion on priority thread re: stats.

I think the processing times tool is relatively new. I believe there was one in November and one in February before May so yes seems to be about quarterly. It's quite a skewed tool - see recent discussion on priority thread re: stats.

It's actually not new at all.
It has been around for several years and is supposed to be updated every month - it used to be updated with the previous month's stats about 2-3 weeks into the next month (I.e. June stats should be posted  around mid-July) but they've been lax/lazy recently and all they've published in the last few months has been:
Oct or Nov 2016 (can't remember which)
Feb 2017
May 2017

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Hi All,

I was wondering if anyone could shed any light on this.
Am I right in assuming that they have different "units" at UKVI Sheffield which process applications dependent on country of applicant?

I can see that there seems to be a variance in timelines between say those applying from the US, or India, or the middle east with different processing times... I would only assume that there is a separate unit for US only applications?

Everything is processed in Sheffield, we think US are processed separately from the rest of the world as US processing is much faster.

Additionally, having had a quick look at the spreadsheet, I can see that the last NP decision/approval was sent on 8th July 2017... and we have not seen any activity for NP applicants so far... would be good to hear updates from those that have also received any decisions after this date to help understand the time frames.

People are mostly pretty cool about posting their updates. When there are anomalies in Priority I private message people in case they have forgotten or got their visas and got busy...

Last question, does anyone know when the .gov websites are updated with the new processing times, as the last updates seem to be in May 2017, so is it every 3 months they update the stats or every month?

I've not seen a regularity to it.

The four phases of UK Spouse Visa Application moods seem to be:

1) Denial. "It can't take long".
2) Anger.  "Those assholes at UKVI". This is when people tend to call the helpline or their MP.
3) Bargaining.  "/crunching data, logging timelines, plotting graphs"
4) Acceptance.   "It will happen".

Hope this helps - we all have a similar yet unique feeling - it's a b*tch. 

It's actually not new at all.
It has been around for several years and is supposed to be updated every month - it used to be updated with the previous month's stats about 2-3 weeks into the next month (I.e. June stats should be posted  around mid-July) but they've been lax/lazy recently and all they've published in the last few months has been:
Oct or Nov 2016 (can't remember which)
Feb 2017
May 2017


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Ha really that's interesting. I think there's a thing on it that says trial tool or words to that effect. Yeah monthly would be a whole lot more useful, even though still fairly misleading

Ha really that's interesting. I think there's a thing on it that says trial tool or words to that effect. Yeah monthly would be a whole lot more useful, even though still fairly misleading

And to show it's been happening for years:

A thread from April 2014 discussing how the processing times haven't been updated since Jan 2014:
http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=82628.msg1100563#msg1100563

And another from 31st October 2015, where the September processing times were up but no October processing times yet:
http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=86324.msg1130134#msg1130134

And from June 2013, where the latest published processing times were from April 2013:
http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=80013.msg1077074#msg1077074



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Everything is processed in Sheffield, we think US are processed separately from the rest of the world as US processing is much faster. People are mostly pretty cool about posting their updates. When there are anomalies in Priority I private message people in case they have forgotten or got their visas and got busy... I've not seen a regularity to it.

The four phases of UK Spouse Visa Application moods seem to be:

1) Denial. "It can't take long".
2) Anger.  "Those assholes at UKVI". This is when people tend to call the helpline or their MP.
3) Bargaining.  "/crunching data, logging timelines, plotting graphs"
4) Acceptance.   "It will happen".

Hope this helps - we all have a similar yet unique feeling - it's a b*tch.

Although, like any grief process perhaps not quite as neatly sequential as that

And to show it's been happening for years:

A thread from April 2014 discussing how the processing times haven't been updated since Jan 2014:
http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=82628.msg1100563#msg1100563

And another from 31st October 2015, where the September processing times were up but no October processing times yet:
http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=86324.msg1130134#msg1130134

And from June 2013, where the latest published processing times were from April 2013:
http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=80013.msg1077074#msg1077074



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Don't think any of us would doubt you Ksand I love how meticulous you are.