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Hi,

I am a new British Citizen and I was filling Form AN for my wife also as she has completed 12 months with ILR. However I have noticed 5 year residency requirement.

In regards to this, my wife's situation is as follows:

1) She entered the UK on 15/09/10 with student visa

2) She switched to self employed visa (application made here, she did not leave the UK). The visa stamp date was 14/10/2011, valid until 14/11/12

3) We went back to our country in May 12 before her self employed visa expired and got married, applied to dependent visa for her (Tier 1 General dependent) and UK entry date is June 12.

4) She got ILR in August 14.

So how does the residency work on our case?

If they count all above, she meets the 5 year residency requirement.

jamal80 wrote:Hi,

I am a new British Citizen and I was filling Form AN for my wife also as she has completed 12 months with ILR. However I have noticed 5 year residency requirement.

In regards to this, my wife's situation is as follows:

1) She entered the UK on 15/09/10 with student visa

2) She switched to self employed visa (application made here, she did not leave the UK). The visa stamp date was 14/10/2011, valid until 14/11/12

3) We went back to our country in May 12 before her self employed visa expired and got married, applied to dependent visa for her (Tier 1 General dependent) and UK entry date is June 12.

4) She got ILR in August 14.

So how does the residency work on our case?

If they count all above, she meets the 5 year residency requirement.

An applicant married to a BC applies under section 6(2) of BNA & requires proof of:
3 years of residency in UK
plus must be able to prove they were physically present in UK 3 years before date of application
plus absences from UK must be within within limits;
ie usually no more than 270 days absent in past 3 years with no more than 90 days absence in past 12 months (before date of application).

Note the 5 year residency requirement applies to applicants who are not married to a BC;
5 years residency also applies to EEA nationals (even if married to a BC) who have obtained settled status by acquiring PR (ie under EU rules) instead of by way of ILR (under UK Immigration Regulations).

So as your wife has settled status in the form of ILR (not as PR), and her spouse is a BC, she needs to demonstrate residency in UK over a 3 year period.

Ref: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... n_2015.pdf

Many thanks for your reply.

In that case I have become a British citizen (literally 3 days ago) and my wife is now married to a British citizen that means she has to show 3 years of continuous residency which is absolutely fine.

However just out of interest, if we have to show 5 years residency, does it matter which types of visas these were under? Student + Self Employed + Dependent = 5 years.

Or once you switch to a new visa, the clock starts from zero again.

jamal80 wrote:Many thanks for your reply.

In that case I have become a British citizen (literally 3 days ago) and my wife is now married to a British citizen that means she has to show 3 years of continuous residency which is absolutely fine.

However just out of interest, if we have to show 5 years residency, does it matter which types of visas these were under? Student + Self Employed + Dependent = 5 years.

Or once you switch to a new visa, the clock starts from zero again.

I am not aware of such a restriction & the naturalisation guidance doesn't state any such restriction.
Lawful residence under immigration rules is a must ofcourse.

A major prerequisite for naturalisation is being free from immigration time restrictions by holding settled status eg ILR.
The test is whether the applicant has ILR not how it was obtained.

jamal80 wrote:Many thanks for your reply.

In that case I have become a British citizen (literally 3 days ago) and my wife is now married to a British citizen that means she has to show 3 years of continuous residency which is absolutely fine.

However just out of interest, if we have to show 5 years residency, does it matter which types of visas these were under? Student + Self Employed + Dependent = 5 years.

Or once you switch to a new visa, the clock starts from zero again.

All legal residence is calculated for the BC qualifying period.