coming back to uk without your eea family member

[alabdullahali]

Hi everyone

my girlfriend is pregnant with our first child. She has a UK residence permit as a family member of an EEA national. I would like her to come and visit me in bulgaria as i am here studying, but the whole visa process can be quite lengthy, so i was thinking about bringing her here accompanied by her eea family member. If she was to come here accompanied by the family member that she got her residence permit under, would she be able to return to the uk on her own, as the family member in question will leave bulgaria before her. please if i can get some replies as soon as possible i would greatly greatly appreciate it

p.s if there is something that wasnt understood dont hesitate to ask

[GMB]

There are two parts to this:
Part 1. Can she re-enter the UK without her EEA family member? Yes, an EEA residence card holder does not have to travel with the EEA family member. I re-enter the UK all the time without my EEA spouse. That's the whole point of the residence card: I'm a resident. As long as she can truthfully say that the EEA family member still resides (maintains their place of residence) in the UK, then she's fine.
Part 2. Can she leave Bulgaria if the EEA family member has left before her? This is more problematic. Bulgaria is not a Schengen member, so those rules don't apply. It would therefore be down to whatever Bulgarian domestic law would apply (would they even let her in just because she's with an EEA sponsor? A Schengen country would have to, but Bulgaria's not Schengen.). Therefore I'd call whatever Bulgarian ministry handles visas and immigration and ask them. Better that than for her to get detained as an illegal of the way out of the country.