Greetings lovely blog readers! Today I am really excited to linkup with two of my favorite bloggers Rachel from Postcards from Rachel and Chelsea from Lost in Travels.  These are two travel loving ladies who have organized a monthly linkup to help build a community of expat bloggers.  I love the idea of meeting fellow expats (or those thinking of becoming an expat) and sharing advice and insights.

I have written about some of my expat musings, victories and frustrations on my blog before {you can read them here}, but I thought that since this was a brand new linkup that I would start from the beginning of my expat tale, by answering the question, “Why?”

The short version is that I met and married a British gent, and when we decided where to establish our newly married life we had to look at the visa process for both the US and the UK.  (To view our full story, go here.) After looking into the processes, applications, the cost and requirements we decided to go forward with applying for a visa to the UK.  (Of course, we also factored in the ability to travel throughout the UK and Europe as a major bonus.)

When we applied for my visa, we applied for a Spousal Visa which is good for 18 months, until September 2014.  After that, I have to reapply to a settlement visa allowing me “indefinite leave to remain” in the United Kingdom.   My current visa allowed me immediate access to the right to work, and after six months allowed me to apply for health care via the NHS.  (Just a heads up, applying to the NHS was dependent upon making contributing payments to the NHS via work.  So even if the six months has passed, you will need to work to apply to the NHS.)

But, I am getting ahead of myself.  Back to the application process itself.  The form is fairly straight forward, asking information about both of us, our work history, relationship, etc. This is the only form we need to fill out (verses multiple forms and step for the US.)  Here are the documents that we needed to provide:

• 2 recent passport photographs and your passport
• evidence of your age and your partner’s age
• official evidence that your and your partner’s previous marriage(s) and/or civil partnership(s) broken down permanently, if either of you has been married or in a civil partnership
• evidence that you intend to marry or register your civil partnership within a reasonable time (usually 6 months)
• evidence that you have met each other
• evidence that you intend to live together permanently after you have married or registered your civil partnership
• evidence of your English language ability
• evidence that you can maintain yourselves and any dependants adequately without needing public funds
• evidence of your accommodation

To break that down into non-legal talk, we submitted telephone records, bank records, a copy of the deed to Neal’s home, my current tax return, current mail for Neal (to prove he is in the UK), airplane tickets and more. Since we handled the visa process on our own, rather than an agency, I submitted more paperwork than we needed to, but I would rather be safe than sorry.

We submitted the the paperwork to the UK Border Agency office in New York and took about 2-3 months for everything to process correctly.  My passport returned with my passport having an amended visa, allowing me to live in the UK and as importantly work.  (I need a way to help fund our European travels!)

If you are thinking of moving to the United Kingdom on a spousal visa, I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.  I found the process to be super stressful and intimidating  so if I can be a resource I would be more than happy to hear from you.  Feel free to e-mail me at belinda@foundlovenowwhat.com.   My next expat challenge, filling American taxes while abroad.  (Yeah, it is as much of nightmare as it sounds.  Look out for another post on that next month!)

If you are looking for other expat stories be sure to check out this great link up!

XO,