Wisconsin to Scotland - Applied for spouse visa to UK

Hi my name is Kerrie and my husband lives in Scotland, I am currently in Wisconsin.  I just sent off my spouse visa application yesterday and received an email today that they have received my application online and it is being prepared by an entry clearance officer.  I did not pay for expedited service as our attorney said it would not make much difference with the processing times.  It has been a little nerve wracking for me as I have read too many stories on declined visas and such so I was hoping to find a forum with people who have been, and are going through this to offer and receive support.  It is very difficult to be away from my husband and we have quite a wait ahead of us so I look forward to making some friends here and sharing my story as we go along. 

Welcome!

Priority is currently processing in about 6-8 weeks and non-priority in 12 weeks plus.

Hi Kerrie, where in WI are you? I'm from La Crosse. You're lucky to be going to Scotland--there's a chance you'll get a proper winter there. I live in the south of England and the winters here are damp and depressing. I can't tell you how much I miss snow!

Hi I am in Stoughton just south of Madison right now.  How did you end up in the south of England?  My husband told me they do get snow in Scotland but I won't miss the frigid, below zero weather here.

Hi I am in Stoughton just south of Madison right now.  How did you end up in the south of England?  My husband told me they do get snow in Scotland but I won't miss the frigid, below zero weather here.

Same as you--it's where my husband's from.

I would never have imagined I'd miss cold winters, but the lack of a hard frost just means that everything is always damp and the damp makes the cold seem colder. It is a great excuse to wear woolly sweaters though. I was just in Scotland on holiday and I bought a tartan wrap that I'm already using in the evenings. It's soooo cozy. Where are you going to be living?

You will laugh at the amount of snow we get in Scotland. You will probably be running around in shorts. Lol

I'm in Central Scotland, by the way. Grew up in Florida but moved here from North Carolina.

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Hi my name is Kerrie and my husband lives in Scotland, I am currently in Wisconsin.  I just sent off my spouse visa application yesterday and received an email today that they have received my application online and it is being prepared by an entry clearance officer.  I did not pay for expedited service as our attorney said it would not make much difference with the processing times.  It has been a little nerve wracking for me as I have read too many stories on declined visas and such so I was hoping to find a forum with people who have been, and are going through this to offer and receive support.  It is very difficult to be away from my husband and we have quite a wait ahead of us so I look forward to making some friends here and sharing my story as we go along. 

Hi Kerrie!  Glad you found us, you've come to the right place! 

 I'm trying to figure out how to reply to each of you, but I'm on my phone and  i'm a little technically challenged. I will be living in Fife, Kelty if approved.  I was hoping I could be out there for Christmas but with the processing times it doesn't look like that will be the case. I was told priority didn't mean much so we didn't apply for it.  No I'm wishing we would've. I'm glad I found this site though because it's difficult for people to understand how hard it is to go through this process.  My husband was supposed to fly out last Monday but for some reason they told him he couldn't fly so I'm going to see if there's a way I can come to him. I don't know if the United States issues something in Lou of a passport but I've been told I'm grounded for now. Does anyone know anything about this?   That's cool that one of you is from Wisconsin and the other from Florida. When my husband was here last, we went to New Orleans and I thought he was going to die from the humidity. He said he had never experienced anything like it. It was kind of comical to see at the time.

You can't come here unfortunately as that would invalidate your application.

Hopefully you'll be here by Christmas! 

It's been a long time since I did my application, but I think you can buy the priority processing and apply it retroactively? Is that still a thing?

FYI going forward: Be very, very careful with so-called lawyers. Many of them don't actually have a clue what they're talking about, and can do a lot of damage to people's applications with their ignorance.

It's been a long time since I did my application, but I think you can buy the priority processing and apply it retroactively? Is that still a thing?

Not any more.

Welcome to the forum, Kerrie .

It's been a long time since I did my application, but I think you can buy the priority processing and apply it retroactively? Is that still a thing?

Unfortunately, they stopped allowing retroactive priority near the end of last year.

Whereas the VFS Global website used to tell you how to do it, now their FAQ just says:

Can I purchase Priority Visa Service/Settlement Priority Visa Service if I have already submitted my application at the UKVI?

No, you cannot purchase the Priority Visa Service/Settlement Priority Visa service once you have submitted your application to the respective UKVI Consulate for processing.

Not any more.

Thought I was going crazy as I remember having done it retroactively but couldnt't see anything indicating this was the case and it's been over 4 years now since I've submitted the application so assumed I just remembered wrong. Good to know that I'm not totally losing it! haha


Welcome to the forum

Thanks for the welcome everyone. Thats a bummer that I can't visit him while I wait.  Its a little different over there.  I have friends here that are bringing their spouse over from different countries and they can live in the US while they go through the process which I think is great and it's too bad I can't stay with him until this is done.  On the UK gov website, it states 100% of visa's are processed within 90 days, is that no longer accurate?  Is there a thread I can go to on here to check this out? Nctami72, where about are you located in Scotland if you don't mind me asking?

Thanks for the welcome everyone. Thats a bummer that I can't visit him while I wait.  Its a little different over there.  I have friends here that are bringing their spouse over from different countries and they can live in the US while they go through the process which I think is great and it's too bad I can't stay with him until this is done.  On the UK gov website, it states 100% of visa's are processed within 90 days, is that no longer accurate?  Is there a thread I can go to on here to check this out? Nctami72, where about are you located in Scotland if you don't mind me asking?

That's 90 business days or 12 weeks.

Unfortunately those statistics are from May, before processing times started to slow for the summer rush.  Hopefully you'll be one of the unicorns randomly selected for faster processing to skew the stats in their favour.  They like to play games unfortunately.   

Check out the non-priority timeline in the visa section.