hi folks, well as most of you have already experienced, or are heading down that route in the future, applying for spouse or fiancee visa can be a long drawn out process.
I guess my fiancee Josephine and myself are some of those lucky people who have the benefit of help from all those on the site that have gone through this process before us.
Although we have been in our relationship for a few years, we only applied for our fiancee visa on April 17 this year via hand delivered application to UKVACs when i was in filipines last time. Within 2 weeks of that we were given a date for interview for 7th June which is quite a long wait (when ur sitting by the phone) from processing our application. In fact we were given 2 dates 7th and 17th but that was just the usual crossed wires at UKVACs.
So as an avid reader of the site for quite some time, we had already gone down the suggested dummy run interviews, and made sure we had answers to all the questions those before us had experienced.
On the day of the interview Josephine was almost first in the que outside, and was called early for interview. In her words the ECO was polite and very nice. he told her there would not be trick questions and proceeded with the interview. Simple questions concerning when and where we met, where i lived, what my appartment was like, When and where the wedding was planned for. In fact, all the questions were actually worded as per the ones on the site, so There was no surprises. The only question asked which i think was stupid was, how long do u intend to stay in uk????? trick or what lol.
The whole interview lasted 10 mins and Josephine was told to wait outside. then was told there were local checks that needed to be completed and they would call her cell when they were done,(i thought they were all supposed to be completed before the interview?). That was 7th June. So even after the interview there's another waiting game, as if we need that. patients got the better of us after 1 week and we called only to be told that the checks were complete now but needed to be reviewed by the ECO. Another 10 days and we called again and after travelling around the telephone hell that is the british embassy phone systen we were finally told...OH YEA, UR VISA IS HERE WE'LL POST IT OUT.
Yes Yes Yes ........ I started to celebrate right away but josephine knows filipines better and would'nt believe it till she got it in her hand, so thursday she qued up at 4.00 and waited. She was last to be called and said there were more people being refused than approved. but at last she got her Passport with the magic approval. What a relief. hopefully now we'll be together in a couple of weeks at the most. just the CFO now.
So... now we can finally plan our future, but we cant do that without one thing ....to say a huge thanks to everyone on the site, especially one guy who took the time to discuss a few concerns we had one 2 one...THANKS PETE. We both know without all you guys there we would probably have been one of the poor unfortunate couples josephine witnessed last week going home with their future plans in ruins.
I guess this adds another sucess to the site, and adds to the growing irish contingent of happy couples.
Thanks to everyone and good luck to all those still going through the process, listen to what people here tell you, they're the best chance you have. jez.....just noticed how long this post was.... i'm off to celebrate some more.....thanks folks
