EEA4 Experience

[Stoggie]

Mods please feel free to move this to the appropriate thread and my apologies for not finding it.

I thought I would take the time to share my experience in applying for my EEA4 permanent residency (now called EEA(PR)). I am doing so because I had to appeal the Home Office's ('HO') decision and part of my research for next steps lead me to this board. Unfortunately, I doubt there is little more that I can contribute other than my story, which I hope may be of assistance to others. I should declare that I am a trained criminal barrister, but I have never dealt with immigration law. I am acquainted with a few immigration judges. However, I did not seek out their advice as this would be unprofessional even though I am no longer in practise.

Timeline:

o End of September 2014: five year family permit was due to expire.
o Beginning of November 2014: applied for EEA4.
o Early March 2015: received notice that the application was refused with right to appeal.
o Mid-March 2015: letter of reconsideration sent to HO caseworker.
o Mid-April 2015: follow-up letter sent to HO caseworker as no reply had been received.
o Mid-April 2015: appeal filed to the First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber).
o Mid-April 2015: reply from HO caseworker indicating that he would be willing to reconsider the application provided the appeal was withdrawn.
o Late-April 2015: letter to HO caseworker stating that the appeal will be withdrawn.
o Late-April 2015: letter to the First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) requesting withdrawal of the appeal.
o Late-April 2015: letter from HO caseworker indicating that once notice from the Tribunal has been received the application will be processed.
o Early May 2015: notice to withdraw acknowledged by the Tribunal.
o Mid-May 2015: permanent residence card issued.

My application was refused on the basis of insufficient evidence that my EEA national, that is, my wife had been exercising her treaty rights during the prescribed period. Also, there was a question of continuous residency during said period.

When all the documents were returned one was missing: a letter from my wife's employers stating her continuous employment since 2007 (beyond the prescribed five-year period).

I accept that I did not provide documents for each of the five years. The reason for this is that I took the view that as my family permit had been issued on the basis of my wife exercising her treaty rights and that as her employment had not changed, as evidenced by the above letter, that it was axiomatic that: she has been in employment and residence for the five-year period.

I would not have known about submitting a letter for reconsideration if not for this forum. Otherwise, I would have resubmitted my application with the additional documents. With regards to the letter for reconsideration, I did provide two documents per year and another letter from my wife's employers.

My wife suspects that the caseworker only decided to action my file once the notice of appeal was received. She may be right as this was a clear cut case. Again, I fully accept that I did not provide every document suggested. The latter is key because the HO does, at times, use ambiguous language.

I was grateful that my caseworker agreed to reconsider. But knew that once I filed the appeal that the HO would lose.

Recently, I have seen that the new application is longer and more tedious. In my view, this is regretful because undoubtedly it will lead to more refusals or delays in processing applications.

If I have one piece of advice to anyone reading this post it is this: be honest and do not hide from the facts or mistakes made. Each application will depend on its facts, and thus every application is different. If one genuinely believes a mistake has been made contact the caseworker. It is obviously a stressful experience but there is light at the end of the tunnel provided everything is correct. It is very easy to get frustrated. Even though I believe the UK government does misapply EC law, the caseworker is only following procedure and did not create the rules and regulations.

Good luck to all genuine applicants.

[EUcards]

Thank you for sharing your experience. I am going through with same situation but have not yet wrote to my case worker though