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Leaving HK for the UK - Savings route for spouse visa and job hunting for myself

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  1. #1

    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Posts
    15

    Leaving HK for the UK - Savings route for spouse visa and job hunting for myself

    Hi team,

    A few things I was wondering some of you may know.

    My wife (HK passport), myself (UK citizen + HK PR) and our 2 year old kid (HK passport, applying for UK one) are planning to leave HK and return back to the UK.

    My original plan was to work until end of this year, quit job, move back to UK (can stay with parents for a few months) and look for a job back in the UK. Rationale is that I'm assuming that being back in the UK for an immediate start would be favourable. However, just seen that I need ~62K GBP or a guaranteed income of 18.5k+ to be able to get the spouse visa. Currently I have around 10K GBP in the UK but could pull together enough in HK. I also have the option of selling a property in the UK if necessary although that wouldn't be favourable.

    Questions:
    1 - For the savings route, does that need to be sat in a UK account or HK account also applies?

    2 - I'd also be interested to hear any forum other people's experiences of job hunting for UK roles whilst still in HK.

    If it helps for context I'm a sales / client services manager for an information services company.

    Thank you!


  2. #2

    Join Date
    Jan 2017
    Posts
    159

    Back in 2016 I wanted to do the same as I'm an only child with an ageing Mum back in the UK. I knew that doing so would not be straightforward and so I contacted British Connections, a company in the Lippo Centre that specialises in advising people who want to return to the UK with their foreign spouse/partner. See:

    https://www.britishconnections.com

    After a half-hour consultation costing HK$2K or 3K I realised that as someone who is self-employed I had zero chance of meeting the Home Office criteria under Theresa May's Hostile Environment policy. I found a secluded stairwell and wept for 5 minutes knowing the decisions I was going to have to make.

    If you can raise the funds it might be doable but the general advice seems to be that one needs to go to the significant expense of hiring a company like British connections to hold your hand through the minefield of discriminatory bureaucracy that the Home Office has become.

    <snip snip>

    Last edited by shri; 12-06-2019 at 11:01 AM. Reason: Lets leave that for another time and another thread please...

  3. #3

    Join Date
    Jan 2018
    Location
    Taiwan and HK
    Posts
    6,158

    Just curious- what are the options for foreign spouses to find work visas in the UK? For example, as Chinese language teacher? Just to get sponsorship? Or is that very difficult in the UK? In the US we have H-1B but it's more for tech skills. We also have transfer visas where you can open a local office of a foreign company and transfer people in L-1. Anything like this in the UK?

    The stories here are quite shocking about the hassle of bringing in legitimate foreign spouses...very sad.


  4. #4

    Join Date
    May 2006
    Location
    Pampanga, Philippines
    Posts
    29,764
    Quote Originally Posted by MABinPengChau:
    Just curious- what are the options for foreign spouses to find work visas in the UK? For example, as Chinese language teacher? Just to get sponsorship? Or is that very difficult in the UK? In the US we have H-1B but it's more for tech skills. We also have transfer visas where you can open a local office of a foreign company and transfer people in L-1. Anything like this in the UK?

    The stories here are quite shocking about the hassle of bringing in legitimate foreign spouses...very sad.
    Very little chance unless they have certain skills (such as medical). Once in on a spouse visa they can work.
    MABinPengChau likes this.

  5. #5

    We did the savings option back in 2017 and have subsequently moved back to HK, so don't know if it is different now, but here is how we did it:

    - cash savings held in my wife's bank account for, as I remember, six months prior to application. We did this by selling property and moving some money around

    It doesn't matter whose bank account as it can be yours, hers or joint. I was the British citizen, but we used my wife's HK account for proof of cash savings.

    The process was quite drawn out and took much longer than the stated timeframe, even though we paid extra for the express service. The Home Office were not hostile - just no communication until the visa was finally approved. If your application is straight forward, I don't see the point in paying extra for an agency to basically fill in forms for you.


  6. #6

    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Posts
    50

    We have recently sent in our application for a UK spouse visa. I would strongly advise you go for the savings route if you possibly can - otherwise you will need to go to UK alone, find a job for at least six months and produce evidence of salary being paid into your bank account for those six months along with a letter from your employer. The savings route cuts out all that crap.
    If you own property in UK which you are renting out you can order a proof of title from the Land Registry office for a mere 3 quid. However you need to show evidence that you or your agent are giving the tenant(s) notice to quit. If staying with your parents I think you'll need to have their written permission and maybe even a report proving there is sufficient room to accommodate you all.
    The (I hope) good news is that, for the last couple of months or so, you now take all your documentation to VFS Global in Causeway Bay. They scan all of them and send it to the Home Office.Previously you had to pack all the documents and have them couriered to the Home Office.
    There is a Facebook page "Spouse Visa Journey UK" which many folks claim has helped them so much they have found it quite unnecessary to use the services of immigration advisers etc.
    Good Luck!


  7. #7

    Join Date
    Feb 2020
    Posts
    7
    Quote Originally Posted by Geraldo:
    We have recently sent in our application for a UK spouse visa. I would strongly advise you go for the savings route if you possibly can - otherwise you will need to go to UK alone, find a job for at least six months and produce evidence of salary being paid into your bank account for those six months along with a letter from your employer. The savings route cuts out all that crap.
    If you own property in UK which you are renting out you can order a proof of title from the Land Registry office for a mere 3 quid. However you need to show evidence that you or your agent are giving the tenant(s) notice to quit. If staying with your parents I think you'll need to have their written permission and maybe even a report proving there is sufficient room to accommodate you all.
    The (I hope) good news is that, for the last couple of months or so, you now take all your documentation to VFS Global in Causeway Bay. They scan all of them and send it to the Home Office.Previously you had to pack all the documents and have them couriered to the Home Office.
    There is a Facebook page "Spouse Visa Journey UK" which many folks claim has helped them so much they have found it quite unnecessary to use the services of immigration advisers etc.
    Good Luck!
    Hi Geraldo,
    I am planning to apply for spouse Visa to UK (from HK), cash savings option is great, but does my husband (British Citizen) has to find a job before moving back to UK? or we can just use saving route to apply without mentioning my husband income in HK?
    Thanks.

  8. #8

    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Posts
    50

    Leaving HK for the UK - Savings route for spouse visa

    Provided you can show you or your spouse have at least £62,500 - or equivalent in another currency - in your account for a period of at least 6 consecutive months when you apply for a UK Spouse Visa your husband does NOT need to have a job lined up. That is what makes the application far simpler.
    If, like most people, you bank on the Internet, you will need to have the six month's statements stamped by the bank - or you can simply arrange with your bank to have them mailed to you, in which case you don't need to have them stamped.
    One thing we did which we discovered made the transition from HK to UK much easier was to ask HSBC to open an account for us in UK before we left HK. Before we left HK we were issued with UK Debit cards - now almost essential in UK - cash has almost disappeared - and then, just days after we arrived, with UK Credit Cards, which, apparently, if you DON'T have one, can be very difficult to obtain if you arrive without a UK Bank account.
    There is a Facebook UK Spouse Visa webpage which is very useful, and a website 'Migrate.org' which is also very helpful.

    chuckster007 likes this.

  9. #9

    I'm in the same boat as the OP and will take the savings route but i wanna know how to move money over to buy a house without incurring too much tax.

    Can my wife bring money over while applying for a spouse visa and how will that get taxed?

    Investor visa is out of reach at a mere 2 Mil.


  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by Geraldo:
    We have recently sent in our application for a UK spouse visa. I would strongly advise you go for the savings route if you possibly can - otherwise you will need to go to UK alone, find a job for at least six months and produce evidence of salary being paid into your bank account for those six months along with a letter from your employer. The savings route cuts out all that crap.
    If you own property in UK which you are renting out you can order a proof of title from the Land Registry office for a mere 3 quid. However you need to show evidence that you or your agent are giving the tenant(s) notice to quit. If staying with your parents I think you'll need to have their written permission and maybe even a report proving there is sufficient room to accommodate you all.
    The (I hope) good news is that, for the last couple of months or so, you now take all your documentation to VFS Global in Causeway Bay. They scan all of them and send it to the Home Office.Previously you had to pack all the documents and have them couriered to the Home Office.
    There is a Facebook page "Spouse Visa Journey UK" which many folks claim has helped them so much they have found it quite unnecessary to use the services of immigration advisers etc.
    Good Luck!
    This is very helpful.

    May I ask, at which stage of the application were you asked to provide tenant notice to quit? Obviously don't want to issue notices then the visa application fall through. Or perhaps initially we want to explore other options eg renting, living with relatives etc. Will proof of title not be sufficient for the purposes of evidencing ownership? Online application phase doesn't ask about tenants specifically if having opted for self-owned.

    Alternative is to get relatives to write a letter to confirm permission to stay - no issue about adequate space etc, just don't want to bother them for paperwork if not necessary.

    Thanks in advance for any experience / tips on this!

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