No. of days allowed out of the UK on HSMP

[rzlaks]

I am currently on an HSMP and my job requires me to travel abroad for work.

Can someone please advise as to how many days can I remain out of the country in order to be successful with my ILR application?

All my international travel is for business purposes.

Will the Home office count these days as absent as well?

[push]

I am currently on an HSMP and my job requires me to travel abroad for work.

Can someone please advise as to how many days can I remain out of the country in order to be successful with my ILR application?

All my international travel is for business purposes.

Will the Home office count these days as absent as well?

Official Trips are ok as far as the current rules are concerned (that too for WP ILR- there is no word on Tier-1, although I am assuming it would be no different from that for WP)

[rzlaks]

Dear Push,

Thanks for the prompt reply, the solicitor who represented my initial application for HSMP says that although it is not a rule, absence over 180 days is always an issue and even an appeal on such grounds generally fail.

He says its irrespective if the trips were for Business or personal purpose.

I hope he is wrong.

I have seen the form and the guidance notes, No information about absence days is mentioned on it.

I have all the letters from my employment that says the trips were official undertaken on behalf of my company.

Will that be sufficient?

[bani]

Dear Push,

Thanks for the prompt reply, the solicitor who represented my initial application for HSMP says that although it is not a rule, absence over 180 days is always an issue and even an appeal on such grounds generally fail.

He says its irrespective if the trips were for Business or personal purpose.

I hope he is wrong.

I have seen the form and the guidance notes, No information about absence days is mentioned on it.

I have all the letters from my employment that says the trips were official undertaken on behalf of my company.

Will that be sufficient?

I've read accounts where people got ILR and the employer letter confirming business trips was sufficient. But because there is no written rule, those may have been at the caseworker's discretion. So you may be lucky or not. If I were you, I would stay under 180 days as much as possible.

[rzlaks]

I have already exceeded 180 days. Infact I have clocked almost 300 days.

I was concerned as if my ILR is not possible, then it makes no sense to live here anymore.

[winber]

There is a huge amount of discussion on this topic on the forum over many posts. Most of it is conflicting and it seems no one really knows including the Home Office. It seems that the case worker has a lot of discretion, so it all depends on who reviews your case.

Some of the different things I have read on forums include:
* Personal leave is counted separately from business leave. You should get your company to write a letter for all business travel days.
* The day you leave and the day you return are not counted, Weekends and public holidays are counted
* Weekends and public holidays are not counted, the day you leave is not counted, but the day you return is counted if it is a business day
* The limit is 180 days
* The limit is 225 days
* The limit is 235 days
* No absence can be for greater than 90 days

When I emailed the Home Office on this question, I got a reply about a month later that said:



Thank you for your enquiry.

Caseworkers will look at any absences in the UK throughout the 5 year qualification period to see if the continuous residence rule is broken. It is normally deemed to be broken by absences of more than 90 consecutive days. However, they can use their discretion if the reason for this absence related to business trips. Additionally, they can also look at the total number of days absence from the UK if this is deemed to be unreasonable.

http://www.ind.homeoffice.gov.uk/siteco ... iew=Binary

You can read the specific guidance at the above link.



Yours sincerely,

Miranda O'Neill
Immigration Group
UK Border Agency



If you get to the bottom of all this, please let us all know!

Note that the absence rules for citizenship are different to ILR, so you need to research that too. From what I can make out, it is a lot more generous than ILR.

[winber]

Here is a link to somebody that said they got ILR with 400 days absences:

http://www.immigrationboards.com/viewto ... lr+abcense

And have a look at this post - especially the post by vito0514 on 9 May 2009:

http://www.immigrationboards.com/viewto ... c&start=20


What do you think?

[tharthar]

Dear all,

Thanks for all the useful information regarding the qualifying period...

I already broke the continuous residence rule by travelling outside Uk for 119 days in total last year because of my business trip..

Could it be concern for my extension in next year and also for my ILR...

Thanks in advance..

[push]

Dear all,

Thanks for all the useful information regarding the qualifying period...

I already broke the continuous residence rule by travelling outside Uk for 119 days in total last year because of my business trip..

Could it be concern for my extension in next year and also for my ILR...

Thanks in advance..

I dont think so. What rule everyone is talking about? Can we have a link to the webpage please?

[bani]

Dear all,

Thanks for all the useful information regarding the qualifying period...

I already broke the continuous residence rule by travelling outside Uk for 119 days in total last year because of my business trip..

Could it be concern for my extension in next year and also for my ILR...

Thanks in advance..

It won't affect your extension, it's not one of the conditions.

ILR, I'm not sure - they could take into account that it was a business trip and still give you ILR. As everyone has said in the posts above, it's up to the caseworker's discretion.

[tharthar]

Thanks for the clarification...

I still have some concern about the issue..

After extension I only have 4 years and 7 months if I count from the day I am in the UK after my travel outside UK for 119 days...
Do i need to try ILR or need to go 2 nd extension just for remaining 5 months...

To be honest I never heard of 2 nd extension before ....am i eligible to do so..

Thanks in advance..

PS: i am now very cautious about travelling outside UK

[winber]

According to the forum, other people have had second extensions.

I think it a much safer way to go, since if your application for ILR was to fail you'd still have plenty of LTR up your sleeve. To be extra safe you could even apply for the extension a few months early.

[dahokolomoki]

I don't think the number of days outside the country affect the HSMP or extensions, or the Tier 1 visa.

It does, however, affect chances of applying of ILR and then eventually citizenship.

The guidance is very misleading and unclear, and it seems to be at the Home Office discretion. Basically if they "feel" that the UK doesn't seem like a proper primary residence for you, then they will reject your application. It is quite hard to argue if you are spending more than 180 days a year outside the UK, even 150 will be a tough sell.

But again, if those trips are for business and most are only a few days long at a time, then a letter from employer plus well documented trips log will be enough.

But if it is like 3 month absences away from the UK, and then one week back, and then another 3 months away, that will probably not pass most caseworkers.

[winber]

The guidance is very misleading and unclear, and it seems to be at the Home Office discretion. Basically if they "feel" that the UK doesn't seem like a proper primary residence for you, then they will reject your application. It is quite hard to argue if you are spending more than 180 days a year outside the UK, even 150 will be a tough sell.

The 180 days refers to 4 years worth of absences, not 1. This works out as 45 days per year. With the move to 5 years for ILR, apparently they are now unofficially allowing 225 days (or 235 days) out of the UK in total over the 5 years.

It is very easy to spend more than 45 days per year outside the UK as I found out when I added up my absences. If you have 6 weeks of annual leave, that's 30 working days. With 5 days holiday from work, you could fly out on a Friday night, return the following Sunday giving 8 full days absent. Six weeks of that comes to 48 days! And if you go away a bank holiday weekend as well, you'll easily get 2 days of absences without even using your annual leave entitlement!

The strange thing is that they are much more generous when it comes to assessing absences for Citizenship - they'll ignore 300 days worth over a 5 year period automatically. And it isn't too hard to qualify for 540 days worth of absences. http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/briti ... cesfromuk/

[vyliss]

I found this link in UKBA web.. Seems its clearly state down maximum 90 continuous days per absence. Also maximum 180 days absence in total for 5 years period. This guidance applies to Tier 1 holder for applying ILR.

http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... iew=Binary

Not really understand how tolerate the case worker for days exceeded due to business trips. They have such a different level of decision maker on that case.

[winber]

It is a pity that they are now saying there is a 6 months allowance of absences over 5 years, since before it used to be 6 months over 4 years.

The whole statement still is very vague:
* It doesn't say exactly how to count an absence
* The way I prefer to read it, is that all absence days due to annual leave are disregarded. On top of that you have a 6 month allowance I'm not sure if that is what they meant, but it is quite easy to interpret it that way.

[push]

It is a pity that they are now saying there is a 6 months allowance of absences over 5 years, since before it used to be 6 months over 4 years.

The whole statement still is very vague:
* It doesn't say exactly how to count an absence
* The way I prefer to read it, is that all absence days due to annual leave are disregarded. On top of that you have a 6 month allowance I'm not sure if that is what they meant, but it is quite easy to interpret it that way.

See this:

Annex A – Calculation of the five year period for settlementIn assessing whether or not an applicant has fulfilled the requirement to have spent five years in continuous residence in the UK, short absences abroad, for example for holidays (consistent with annual paid leave) or business trips (consistent with maintaining employment or self-employment in the United Kingdom), may be disregarded, provided the applicant has clearly continued to be based here.

This is obviously over and above the normal annual leave entitlement

[vyliss]

As my interpretation, if someone spent over 90days in one go, or over 180day in 5 years, they will have different level of decision maker.

Provided if we could present prove to satisfy them that we are still based here. Maybe letter from employer or house rental/mortgage. That could strength the application. My friend said mortgage is the best prove to show that we keen to stay here and high chances to get ILR.

[Sushil-ACCA]

WHAT happens if some one is refused

than they have to wait 4 or 5 years (JR REVIEW CASE )

[Sushil-ACCA]

no one taker

[vyliss]

review I guess.. but first he must apply for FLR.. depend on what reason and how serious it is, I think they don't have specific guidelines, more rely on caseworker and tolerance.