Visas – Continuous Residence Requirements
Are you, or members of your family due to apply for their ‘Settlement’ or Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) application in the future? If so, you will want to confirm their eligibility for this by checking their ‘Continuous Residence’ in the UK.
What does Continuous Residence mean?
This is a term used by the Home Office in the UK to confirm if someone has been in the UK with:
- Relevant permission to be in the UK – the correct visa and;
- They have not been absent for more than the specified periods
For most of the families we support, their ‘Continuous Residence’ period begins from when they enter the UK on their first ‘Limited Leave to Enter’ visa, which usually lasts for 5 years. Any family member who entered the UK on this visa should have been granted a five-year leave period. Their ‘qualifying period’ starts on the day they enter the UK.
To meet the ‘Continuous Residence’ requirements, therefore, to be eligible for ‘Settlement’, also known as; Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR), applicants must not have spent more than 180 days outside of the UK in any 12-month period in their 5-year period in the UK.
Transitional Arrangements
We at NFF, understand that in certain circumstances, such as deployments, some spouses but particularly children of serving personnel may have returned to their country of origin for extended periods of time for childcare or support purposes while their serving person is deployed.
Recent changes in the ‘Continuous Residence’ guidance means that those with absences in their qualifying period before applying for ILR, (Settlement) will be offered transitional arrangements up until 8th October 2024.
This means that any absences from the UK which began before the above date will not be considered when calculating absences from the UK. As long as the applicant meets all the other eligibility criteria, they will be able to apply as normal.
The future
Any absences after the 8th of October 2024, will, however, be considered on an ILR (Settlement) application in the future so, family members must not be absent for more than 180 in any 12-month period if they are planning to apply for ILR in the future.
Have you had an assignment Overseas?
If you, or your family member’s have served on an overseas assignment, any time as part of this assignment will be treated as though you were in the UK. This means that time spent overseas on a foreign assignment will not be counted towards your continuous residence period. If you meet all the other requirements, you should be eligible to apply for ILR if, you provide evidence you were overseas as part of an assignment order. You can do this by providing evidence which shows;
- A letter confirming the serving person and family members were assigned overseas.
- The dates in which the family members were overseas.
- When they returned to the UK (if you are still overseas you may include the planned return date).
Planning on applying for Settlement or ILR?
If yours, or your family member’s visa is due to expire and they are planning on applying for Settlement (ILR), please contact the immigration team via email: immigration@nff.org.uk
Sophie and Pete can assist you with the application process and will also be able to confirm eligibility for the application.