Personal Finances

[Belmontboy]

Hi Everybody, I need some advice,

My fiancee' from manila and I are about to submit paperwork for her Visa to the UK (Fiancee' visa). We have all the proof of our meetings and pages and pages of MSN Chat transcripts and phone bills that prove we have remained in contact, and we also have the receipit for our planned wedding in July.

I am, however, a little worried about my finances and need some advice.

All the bank statements I have sent (past 6 months) are healthy and show no fees, no overdrafts, no charges etc etc so that is good. However, I am just about to come out of a Trust Deed (an IVA) due to some problems in the past, and I am not sure if I should declare this, or not, in my letter of sponsorship.

I have a full time Job, and a part time Job and my take home pay is £2200. After my mortgage, loans, car, trust deed etc etc
comes off every month, I have a disposable income of around £400 ... this will increase to £600 after February when the trust deed ends.
Also, I am slowly building up savings and now have £300, growing monthly...this I can prove to the Embassy.

(1) IS a disposable income of £400 enough proof that I can support my Fiancee' ?

(2) Should I declare the Trust deed, and include a letter from the Trustee CONFIMRING that payments will cease on February ?

I'm worried that being in a trust deed (or having been in one) will affect my aplication but any advice will be appreciated.

Cheers

Simon

[joebloggs]

1) yes, the minimum you need is about £95 a week after your mortgage and util bills have been paid. so you've easily got that

2) is your payment of the trust deed shown on your bank statements ? if it is then i probably would mention it, and that it ends in feb, if its not on your bank statements, then i probably would not mention it, just keep it simple and try to mention only the positives

nah i don't think it would effect your application..

thou your savings are low, and the case worker might question how you can afford, air tickets, pay for a wedding etc, and support your fiancee as she will not be able to work until she has FLR.

can you not borrow a bit of cash from family and friends, if worse a loan of a couple of £k ?. bit late now thou as you intend to apply..

it's still possible with hardly any savings, but you want to reduce the risk as much as possible, the most important thing is you have a job thou

[Belmontboy]

Hi Joe

(1) Yes, the Trust Deed shows up on my last 6 monts bank statements, hence the reason for asking about declaring it.

(2) In Terms of Air tickets and the Visa, I will pay for the Visa with my Mastercard (which is Fully Paid off) and then, I will pay that off in February / March, and then use the Mastercard again to pay for her flights. I will mention this in my letter of sponsorship also...will that be helpfull / acceptable ?

We are just having a small wedding, so costs will be minimal.

Can I send you a copy of my letter to see if its acceptable ?

Many Thanks


Simon

[Justins]

1) yes, the minimum you need is about £95 a week after your mortgage and util bills have been paid. so you've easily got that

2) is your payment of the trust deed shown on your bank statements ? if it is then i probably would mention it, and that it ends in feb, if its not on your bank statements, then i probably would not mention it, just keep it simple and try to mention only the positives

nah i don't think it would effect your application..

thou your savings are low, and the case worker might question how you can afford, air tickets, pay for a wedding etc, and support your fiancee as she will not be able to work until she has FLR.

can you not borrow a bit of cash from family and friends, if worse a loan of a couple of £k ?. bit late now thou as you intend to apply..

it's still possible with hardly any savings, but you want to reduce the risk as much as possible, the most important thing is you have a job thou

Hi, Joe,
I agree with you as whatever you have said is all right. And it happens in real. Well i also think that we have to mentioned all things simply so that it will be easy to understand also by others.

[somebody]

Hi Joe

(1) Yes, the Trust Deed shows up on my last 6 monts bank statements, hence the reason for asking about declaring it.

(2) In Terms of Air tickets and the Visa, I will pay for the Visa with my Mastercard (which is Fully Paid off) and then, I will pay that off in February / March, and then use the Mastercard again to pay for her flights. I will mention this in my letter of sponsorship also...will that be helpfull / acceptable ?

We are just having a small wedding, so costs will be minimal.

Can I send you a copy of my letter to see if its acceptable ?

Many Thanks


Simon

Others know better than me im sur on the matter of iva's.

But my view wud be to mention if it is noticed and you have not mentioned it will at least delay your application as they will think hang on what else have we not been told?

Think of the money side as if your creating a new business or showing the bank your worthy of a loan. Basically show you have taken everything into account and your in control of your money matters. Which from what i read you have in fact more than most.

All they are looking for is that the applicant will not be a burden to society and public funds, which is fair enough i guess.

As she will not be, as your detailed accounts will show then they should be abale to give you a big tick on that section.

[joebloggs]

Others know better than me im sur on the matter of iva's.

But my view wud be to mention if it is noticed and you have not mentioned it will at least delay your application as they will think hang on what else have we not been told?

Think of the money side as if your creating a new business or showing the bank your worthy of a loan. Basically show you have taken everything into account and your in control of your money matters. Which from what i read you have in fact more than most.

All they are looking for is that the applicant will not be a burden to society and public funds, which is fair enough i guess.

As she will not be, as your detailed accounts will show then they should be abale to give you a big tick on that section.

that's one thing andy, they ask how much savings you have, but not how much debt you have

yes say i had £5,000 in my current account, which i transferred from my credit card, then i applied for a new CC which was interest free for 9 or 12 months, then when i had my 6 months worth of bank statements, paid the CC card off with the money in the current account..

people needs to plan for after the wedding to, and not for just b4 !!

[somebody]

that's one thing andy, they ask how much savings you have, but not how much debt you have

yes say i had £5,000 in my current account, which i transferred from my credit card, then i applied for a new CC which was interest free for 9 or 12 months, then when i had my 6 months worth of bank statements, paid the CC card off with the money in the current account..

people needs to plan for after the wedding to, and not for just b4 !!

Indeed many people think sorted we got the visa, but for many particularly now its very hard to bring a person to a country and support them.

[joebloggs]

Indeed many people think sorted we got the visa, but for many particularly now its very hard to bring a person to a country and support them.

i meant instead of planning their wedding, plan how you are going to get your visa to, like evidence and especially 6 months worth of good bank statements

many spend all their efforts planning to get wed, plan your visa first !, then you will not have to wait months after your wed to apply because of poor savings, sort your money out first, in most cases its not that you have to save the money its the 6 months waiting

[somebody]

i meant instead of planning their wedding, plan how you are going to get your visa to, like evidence and especially 6 months worth of good bank statements

many spend all their efforts planning to get wed, plan your visa first !, then you will not have to wait months after your wed to apply because of poor savings, sort your money out first, in most cases its not that you have to save the money its the 6 months waiting

LOL

Well wedding, visa, and just coping after that is a struggle. Not many phills are going to walk into jobs as many members on here have in recent years. very little credit about to tide you over if expenses are bigger than expected. Well we all know the rest

[Jonnywina]

Very good posts and I am in the same boat i.e. will apply for settlement visa in May. From what I have read and I have been watching for over 6 months now. Money matters is very important for the ECO. If you have no savings, no cash surplus then you will most likely end up using public finances.

I have been watching my current accounts very closely since my wedding back in Oct. I have some debt and 2 credit cards. 1 card is 0% till Nov 09 and the other has no debt. My problem is:

! have 2 current accounts, 1 A&L and the other Halifax. My loan and credit card is paid out of halifax and my salary is paid into A&L. I have a £800-900 cash surplus after all expenses and I live at home so costs are low.

I have £4500 in 2 saving accounts but will only be able to show 5 months records as I move money around to get the best rate. My question is should I include my halifax statements when I submit the application?

Is my finances in good order or need improvement?

Thanks for a great wealth of information.

[joebloggs]

in your Halifax account, have any of your statements been over drawn ? how much have you in the account for each of the 5 months ?

i never explained that i owed money on CC, none of their business,

whats most important is that you have a job and a steady amount of money coming in your account each month

if you've got £4,500 in total you shouldn't have a problem thou

[Jonnywina]

my job is safe right now and we are more busier than ever. I work in a food factory and this sector is safe. My halifax current account was in the red till January but has £1600 in it right now. My A&L a/c has been between £200- 1000 in cash for last 6 months. I did a 10k loan last month to pay off all debts and make into 1 payment. This will come out of halifax.

My £4500 is split across 3 accounts but thinking of putting all into abbey and keeping £500 min balance in each current account. We are working on our application right now and will submit in May.

Thanks for all your help.

[PAT]

my job is safe right now and we are more busier than ever. I work in a food factory and this sector is safe. My halifax current account was in the red till January but has £1600 in it right now. My A&L a/c has been between £200- 1000 in cash for last 6 months. I did a 10k loan last month to pay off all debts and make into 1 payment. This will come out of halifax.

My £4500 is split across 3 accounts but thinking of putting all into abbey and keeping £500 min balance in each current account. We are working on our application right now and will submit in May.

Thanks for all your help.

Goodluck Jonnywina....

[joebloggs]

try not to send statements where your over drawn, they could use it as one of the reasons to refuse your visa. also If there are disproportionate deposits and withdrawals in the bank statements, they should be explained in the sponsor's letter. so try not to send any statements with a lot of cash going in

so if you need to wait for a month or 2 to get rid of your early bank statements it might be worth waiting ..

[Jonnywina]

On my statements I have moved around £10k between the 2 accounts. I have paid off 1 credit card and 1 loan. This shows on both accounts. I may just show 6 months of A&L and 3 months of Halifax. Will this be acceptable? My problem is that halifax was overdrawn in January.

Should I send credit card statements? I don't like to considering 3rd party is handling visa.

Thanks for all your help.

Jonathan

[joebloggs]

i would explain any large movements of money on your bank statements in your letter of support, saying you've paid a loan and a CC off, thou it would have been better not showing any statements with large deposits or withdraws.

yes you should be ok to send 3 of one of them, as long as you have 6 statements of the other account, you only really need to supply statements for 1 account, but if you've got 2 showing a good balance then

i never sent a CC statement, i even used my credit card to transfer £5k to my current account, then transferred the debt to my other CC which had 9 months interest free for CC transfers , got my 6 banks statements, then paid the CC off with the money

just need to plan, but some people don't