My name is David and I would like to know if you could offer me some advice.

My Thai girlfriend (Nock) was recently refused a UK visitors visa to come and visit with me in the UK We really want to reapply for a UK visitor’s visa but we are not very confident after being denied first time.
I am a registered nurse working full time. Have a home and money in the bank
She was denied the visa because:
1. They could not be convinced that Nock would return to Thailand when the time was up.
2. She has a very limited travel history she has been around Thailand and parts of Laos but that is it.
3. We had asked for up to six months for length of stay – do you think we should change that to 4-6 weeks?

Reason for UK Visitor Visa

We stated that her reason to visit was to meet my family and friends and see what British culture is like. Her current employment situation is such that she has a degree in Mass Communication – worked for firms as a secretary and about 2 years ago stopped working for Tesco Lotus for whom she worked in management. She speaks good English and is very personable. She was able to purchase a new car and an empty lot in Korat, Nakhon

She also owns a business in Chiang Rai (a watch and clock store). She also sells Giffarine cosmetic products. Nock has an apartment in Bangkok and had showed that she would sublet the apartment to her close friend Jimmy from Chiang Rai – she is also a business owner and goes to Bangkok periodically for business.

Since quitting working at Tesco Lotus Nock has been able to maintain her lifestyle with apartment, car and has also been able to go home for periods of time and help her mother with the family store in Prathai Prathai (about 70 mins from Korat).

When Nock is tending the store her mom, and sisters can work on the farm. Nock is very close to her family, we both have plans if it all works out to live part time in Canada and part time in Thailand. I am hoping to go to Thailand in October and take a scuba diving course that lasts 7 months – I believe that this would be a productive and yet fun way to be able to be with my girlfriend. I was hoping that when I am finished the course in May that I would be able to bring back Nock with me to the UK where I would return to work as a nurse at the Hospital here in Liverpool and go back to Thailand in October 2010 to work as a scuba diving instructor.

I must say that I really don’t understand the Embassy saying no to her application for visitor’s visa. It makes me wonder if all of the file was read. The interviewer had asked Nock what she planned to do in Canada. Nock told her that she would like to visit my family and friends and see where I work and my culture. The interviewer told Nock to wait until her boyfriend comes from the UK and visits you for 6 months. This news was heartbreaking!

We have talked on the phone almost daily. We text each other almost daily. We think about each other all the time. She is NOT a bar girl, we don’t go to bars at all. We are both very traditional and respectful of each other. We are considering spending the rest of our lives together. This letter is very personal and I am writing to a stranger (I am desperate), I really hope that there is something that can be done to allow my girlfriend to come to Canada. I appreciate your assistance in this matter. If you have any good ideas I would love to know them.
Should she get her mother and aunt to write a letter?
What could we do? My Best Regards.
David

Reason for Refused UK Visitors Visa

The mistake David has made is unfortunately made every day by people when applying for a visa to the UK. HE doesn’t fully understand what is needed to obtain a UK visa and therefore is shooting in the dark.

He wants help and only free help, which I understand, but all the help he has had up to now has ensured that his girlfriend remains in Thailand and now has a black mark against her passport.

As of writing this, I did not see the official Visa refusal form but from Davids comments, believe that the area the visa needs the most help is with his Thai girlfriend Nock. The embassy is not confident that she will return to Thailand at the end of the visa even though Nock
Has a business
Owns a car
Has an apartment in Bangkok
Works with her family

The fact that Nock was called to the embassy for an interview suggests to me that the application was weak and the visa officer was unsure as to issue the visa or not, but the interview ended with a denial anyway.

I feel confident that we can obtain a UK visitor visa for Nock to travel to the UK, A visitor visa will allow for her to spend upto six months with David. We will need the visa refusal form given by the embassy and the original visa application file.

There is not a day goes by were we do not here clients having problems with Thailand visa companies that start with a very low price “normally 5,000 to 10,000 Thai baht” to obtain a UK tourist visa for your Thai wife/ Thai girlfriend. After you pay the money they then increase their price as the application progresses to a staggering amount of money. The amount of money is always higher than what you could have paid a professional visa company that is not in the habit of telling lies and gives you the true cost at the start of the process. The expenses incurred during an application for a UK tourist visa if done properly should equate to much more that 10,000 Thai baht so this should explain why to be careful.

Unfortunately we see this scam happening to a clients Thai wife/ Thai girlfriend when applying for a UK tourist visa because they tend to go for the lowest price because they are careful with money and they do not take in to consideration the professionalism of the company it seems that the lower the price the better the deal which is normally the Asian way of doing business. When the foreigner leaves it to his Thai wife/ Thai girlfriend to obtain the UK tourist visa this is when the problems start and the nightmare for the UK sponsor begins.

UK sponsor is in the hands of a Thai Visa company

In most cases the UK sponsor is in the hands of a Thai Visa company that speaks very little broken English and he does not have a clue how to proceed or what is going on with the paperwork and why this company keeps asking for extra money for things that don’t need doing!!! In most cases we see the UK sponsor just goes with the flow because he does not know there is a different way to apply for a UK tourist visa. After a length of time the application will be submitted and then it is a game of Russian roulette if the visa is awarded or not and at this stage you may have paid expenses of approx 40,000 Thai baht and no visa has been awarded yet “but they started cheap”.

If the visa is finally awarded then you may find that this is when the extra expenses will be asked for because they feel that now success has been achieved you should pay for their services and we have seen cases were in the end the visa has cost anything in the region of 60,000 to 120,000 Thai baht for a visa that started at 10,000 Thai baht and please rest assured they are not interested if you never go back to them to use their services again or you give them bad reports you are wasting your time.

in the end the visa has cost anything in the region of 60,000 to 120,000 Thai baht

Normally if the visa is refused then you will probably always get a response saying “it is not our fault” and they will ask you for money again to re-apply for the visa and because you are so deep in with them and they have all your documentation the UK sponsor tends to say reluctantly “yes” and the whole process starts again with different reasons this time for needing money. We also see on numerous occasions that they refuse to give you back your documentation so you have to use their services again.

In any business nobody works for nothing and every business person does expect to earn a living but there is a correct way of doing business and our feeling has always been why would you dream of paying money up front in full or a deposit if the job has not been finished or definitely if the job has not been started.

In the UK if you were having a new engine installed in your car you would agree the price first and you would not pay a penny until the engine was running and you was happy with the performance!! So why would you pay money to a foreign company you don’t know and have had no dealings with and in most cases never walked in their office!! In most cases the UK sponsor tends to love his Thai wife/Thai girlfriend and as a result lets love cloud his judgment which is only natural and we understand. No company can guarantee a visa because the British Embassy make the final decision so paying them money up front is like betting money on a 3 legged horse and should never be done.

You should pay for a visa and all expenses when the UK tourist visa is in your Thai wife/ Thai girlfriends passport and not before. If the company states a 100% guarantee then let them stand behind this guarantee by only asking for money when the visa is awarded and paying all expenses incurred until success is achieved as we have always done at Key Visa Company we never ask for money up front or a deposit and would not accept if you offered this is our guarantee to you as our client that we stand behind our promises.

Never pay money up front to A Thailand Visa Company

Never pay money up front to A Thailand Visa Company not even a deposit because you will lose it!! Always agree a price first and have it in writing via a fax or an e-mail before you start the process as we always do with our clients so you know where you stand.

The above statement is written as guidance to future clients and is not written to offend. There are numerous good companies but we feel that if we write to teach then it is only the bad companies that have to be concerned.

Others Thais and people from other countries are also refused UK tourist visas down because they had never previously taken any foreign travel or could not speak English.

Ridiculous reasons for rejecting UK Tourist Visas

The “ridiculous reasons” for rejecting visas were set out in a report by the independent monitor of UK visas. Linda Costelloe Baker’s reported that “Despite such flaws there had been significant improvement in quality.” she went on to say “Entry clearance officers could use some ridiculous reasons when refusing visa for tourist visits”. She said a common reason for refusal was “you wish to go to the UK for a holiday. You have never previously undertaken any foreign travel before and I can see little reason for this trip”.

Examples of visa refusal using Non-plain English by Visa Officers

You have failed to complete pivotal areas of Section 6
I can only assess your mutual knowledge in a subjective context
The provenance of the funds depicted is not evidenced allied to other financial commitments

There had been improvement in the language used by Visa officers to explain refusals to applicants since the “very strange wordings” seen during the previous assessment.

Though the report still asks for “Plain English please!”

Reasons Given for UK Tourist rejection

In the same report Linda says “This is a common reason for refusal but there was a first time for everyone who has gone abroad on a holiday and not having done it before is an acceptable reason for travel”. Another reason to reject a UK tourist visa was “you plan a holiday for no particular purpose other than sightseeing”. To which the report replied “But that’s what the UK is famous for, sights worth seeing.”

Linda highlights the case of a person whose UK Tourist Visa request was rejected by an officer because they had “little or no idea what you plan to see or do”. This was, she discloses, because the person had answered the question on a form asking why they were going to the UK, with the words “annual leave vacation”.

Another woman was criticised for not researching the UK’s background when she said she wanted to spend her four-month visit to her fiance to “just live as a housewife”. “I suspect being a housewife for four months was all she wanted to do and the Immigration Rules didnt allow that,” Mrs Costelloe Baker said.

In one case, a man was refused a visa because the officer thought it not credible that he was going to stay in a hotel in Cirencester “far from [his] friends in Surrey and Kent”. The hotel was in fact in London and the man had told the officer that he had not wanted to put a burden on his friends for his entire 28-day visit.

One applicant wrote: “I just want a holiday, my friends live near the seaside” to which the officer replied “You have not named any places you will see”. Mrs Costelloe Baker said this was not the case – the applicant had named the “Seaside”.

If other countries operated with the same Tourist Visa rules

She said the numbers of British people “going on their holidays” would be cut if other countries emulated the UK visas officials who rejected a tourist visa request because the applicant did not have a “sufficient command of the language for the purposes of tourism”.

The report covered the first three quarters of 2006.
Mrs Costelloe Baker, who is independent but appointed by the Foreign Office, concluded that overall “there has been a significant improvement in the quality of UKvisas work compared with 2005 and I have found that refusal notices are more consistent and less idiosyncratic”.

Source: Independent Monitor