Hi everyone!
I've been lurking on this thread for a while and I just wanted to thank you to everyone for sharing their knowledge and experiences as it helped to keep me really calm during a very nail biting time. My partner and I had our visa approved last week (yay!) and I thought I'd share our timeline and our experience:
Service: Priority
Application Sent: 16/10/18
Biometrics Taken: 23/10/18 (Paris VAC)
Acknowledgement email: 05/11/18
Decision Made: 27/11/18 (Approval)
Visa Received: 06/12/18
After 30 WD (04/12/18) we still hadn't heard anything so I called the UKVI helpline (the paid phone line). The guy on the phone told me a decision had been made but that he couldn't tell us the answer, just that we had to wait to be summoned by the VAC but did not know when this might be. We didn't hear from the VAC so my partner went to the VAC in person (luckily it's not too far away). They checked their database and confirmed that a decision had been made on the 27th of November. They requested the passport there and then and asked my partner to come back the following day whereby we received our decision envelope. I don't know if this is possible for everyone, but if it is I would strongly recommend chasing!. If we hadn't proactively chased then we would have been waiting longer.
Hope that helps! And good luck to everyone still awaiting their decisions
