FLR Documents not received by Home Office??

[Rob180]

My wife has received an email from the Home Office saying her supporting documents have not been received. I posted these by RM Special delivery on May 17th. They were delivered and signed for on May 22nd in Sheffield. They were slow to get there because it was a weekend and the HO mail system seems to involve redirection from 1 PO Box address to another. I have replied to their email today advising them of the above and sent them the scanned receipts for both sending and delivery/collection. The documents are somewhere in their building, they signed for them and collected them! Has anyone experienced problems like this before? What will they do to resolve it, as I've got proof of sending and delivery/collection? I checked in case the email was a scam email but it appears to be genuine as the FLRMValidate@home office.gov.uk address is mentioned and comes up on email check sites as valid. What are they going to do if they can't locate it? I might not have copies of some of the documents that were in that envelope.

[Rob180]

A letter arrived today saying all the documents have now been digitally scanned, hence are enclosed. I don't understand why they are sending out emails saying they have not received any documents putting people into blind sweats when in actual fact they were in the process of scanning them. More so as there were articles in The Guardian last year saying the Home Office had LOST hundreds of documents including visa applications. None of the correspondence you ever get from them ever has a direct phone number for who sent it and it also does not have an address saying where it came from. They also send emails saying 'we don't have your documents' and when you reply, they don't even answer. This application was sent to DURHAM but when it arrived it was redirected to at least 1 location in Sheffield according to Royal Mail. Not only do you not really know where your passports, marriage certificates, bank statements etc are going, when they get to this unknown place you get emails saying they've not got them, then letters saying they have, but with no address on them. For this 'in the dark' service including having to sweat over letters saying we don't have your documents, you are charged over £1000. The only way to avoid this shambles is the premium service, but that costs another £700 or something. The whole system seems to be a shambles.

[rasg]

It sounds to me that you sent your documents to the wrong place right in the middle of the change from the old system where previously you posted or couriered everything to a PO Box in Durham and the new system where your wife's goes to one of the Sopra Steria centres dotted around the UK. I understood that settlement visas were sent to Sheffield and I specifically remember that I sent my wife's first FLR documents to Durham.

 

My wife went to Reading Library on the 2nd May for her second FLR where she supplied biometrics etc. You now have a choice of scanning and uploading your documents yourself or taking them with you where the centre will scan them for you.

 

I know of at least one other applicant who posted their documents when they should have used the new system.

 

 

[Rob180]

Hi RASG. To be honest that address was the only one I could find. Predictably I've had no response to 3 queries about why they sent that letter. It's like talking to a tailor's dummy contacting them. Although one of them might give more of a response. Her biometrics were also done by S.Seria as you say, long before that letter came out saying they didn't have her documents. They must be processing the application, but I won't be contacting them to ask as they don't answer anything.

 

i saw on another forum that other people have also had the 'we don't have your documents' letter when they did. The system is a shambles.

[rasg]

But you used the wrong system in the first place. Not sure how you can complain that they lost your documents when you shouldn’t have sent them. My guess, and it's only a guess) is they had a problem matching up hundreds, or even thousands, of parcels to the applications where many applicants didn't check what the new procedure was or if there was a new procedure. I found out early in April before we went to Reading library from a different forum by asking questions and also seeing posts from others who had been through the new application process. That's how I knew that I needed to scan everything or have them scanned at the centre. My guess is that the letters are computer generated. The main thing is that your wife's application is in the system. My wife's visa was granted in four and a half weeks. Under the old system it was 7 or more.

[Rob180]

It appears that I did send everything to the wrong address. I sent it to Durham, which I think was on the Guidance Notes. I didn't scan anything, I sent everything in the post. I didn't know you could just scan them. The whole process and the way you can't find specific answers to questions anywhere without spending days searching just bores me into oblivion now. That's probably why I ended up posting it all, to just get it out my face ????

 

 

[darren1971]

26 minutes ago, Rob180 said:

It appears that I did send everything to the wrong address. I sent it to Durham, which I think was on the Guidance Notes. I didn't scan anything, I sent everything in the post. I didn't know you could just scan them. The whole process and the way you can't find specific answers to questions anywhere without spending days searching just bores me into oblivion now. That's probably why I ended up posting it all, to just get it out my face ????

 

 

They don't make these things clear and users are left to rummage through forums for answers, piss poor system really. I have been watching the current BBC series on immigration and it's a shambles unlikely to improve anytime soon... good luck with your FLR.

 

I thought I would make double sure by asking for confirmation of the address at VFS Bangkok... gave me the wrong address and were completely unaware of any rule changes that had been in place for over a month!

[rasg]

47 minutes ago, Rob180 said:

It appears that I did send everything to the wrong address. I sent it to Durham, which I think was on the Guidance Notes. I didn't scan anything, I sent everything in the post. I didn't know you could just scan them. The whole process and the way you can't find specific answers to questions anywhere without spending days searching just bores me into oblivion now. That's probably why I ended up posting it all, to just get it out my face ????

 

 

I sent my wife's first FLR docs to Durham and that was the right thing to do up until March/April this year when they changed the system. One of the reasons I hang around forums like this is I get to know about changes to the requirements or systems fairly quickly. I find just asking a question or two on the forums and getting up to date answers sends me in the right direction when I start putting an application together for my wife. FLR this year is a good example. My guess is that you were using the wrong guidance notes. On the FLR online application itself there is no reference to the guidance notes at all and I did have to do a bit of digging. The latest notes (FM-SE) were updated in April and I know of others who were using them from 2016. The new system worked fine for us and I prefer it but when we attended the centre in Reading, only to be told that UK wide it had crashed for four hours. We were fortunate and as the big queue in front of us fell by 50% because people had other commitments it meant that we were able to have some lunch and pop back to submit the visa.

 

Have you heard back on your application yet? My wife's took just over four weeks. A huge improvement on the seven weeks that her first FLR took. My guess is that the caseworker has everything on screen in front of them rather than wading through a mountain of documents.  

[blackcab]

On 6/18/2019 at 5:44 AM, Rob180 said:

Not only do you not really know where your passports, marriage certificates, bank statements etc are going, when they get to this unknown place...

 

A little known fact is that anyone can telephone Royal Mail customer services and ask for the full street address of any PO Box.

 

All PO Boxes must be linked to a physical street address, and the Royal Mail are quite clear that they will provide this information on request.

[OJAS]

On 7/6/2019 at 8:16 PM, blackcab said:

Royal Mail are quite clear that they will provide this information on request.

So presumably they don't feel constrained by the General Data Protection Regulation in this particular instance then?

[blackcab]

29 minutes ago, OJAS said:

So presumably they don't feel constrained by the General Data Protection Regulation in this particular instance then?

 

You should ask them because it's an interesting point. I can't speak for Royal Mail, but it would be good to know the answer.

 

It's a bit off topic, but still, it would be good if you could let us know the outcome.

[Rob180]

28 minutes ago, Rob180 said:

 

Hi RASG, yes a letter came back saying her leave was granted. A new Biometric Residence Permit also arrived.  It took about 6 weeks all in.....not bad. However, about 3 weeks ago a letter also came saying all documents had been scanned and were being returned, except her passport which was being retained under Section 17 of the Asylum and Immigration Act (Claimants) 2004. I assumed at the time that this would only be until her application was assessed, but as yet her passport has not come back? 

 

Section 17 appears to apply to cases where leave may be terminated. I don't understand this, or why her case would ever have been considered as one which may be refused. Her application met all the criteria, she has no history of not complying with immigration rules or anything else which would make her application anything other than bog standard average. Regardless, her FLR has been granted so why would her passport not have re-appeared by now? 

 

I

 

 

[Rob180]

On 7/6/2019 at 2:16 PM, blackcab said:

 

A little known fact is that anyone can telephone Royal Mail customer services and ask for the full street address of any PO Box.

 

All PO Boxes must be linked to a physical street address, and the Royal Mail are quite clear that they will provide this information on request.

That's useful to know thanks.

[rasg]

16 hours ago, Rob180 said:

Hi RASG, yes a letter came back saying her leave was granted. A new Biometric Residence Permit also arrived.  It took about 6 weeks all in.....not bad. However, about 3 weeks ago a letter also came saying all documents had been scanned and were being returned, except her passport which was being retained under Section 17 of the Asylum and Immigration Act (Claimants) 2004. I assumed at the time that this would only be until her application was assessed, but as yet her passport has not come back? 

 

Section 17 appears to apply to cases where leave may be terminated. I don't understand this, or why her case would ever have been considered as one which may be refused. Her application met all the criteria, she has no history of not complying with immigration rules or anything else which would make her application anything other than bog standard average. Regardless, her FLR has been granted so why would her passport not have re-appeared by now? 

I have no idea why they’ve retained her passport. Seems very odd. With the new system after scanning and submitting FLR my wife's passport was returned to her but I understand that she wasn't allowed to use it while the visa was being considered.

[Rob180]

I've read elsewhere that some other people have received passports back 2 or 3 weeks or even longer after leave was granted. I suppose I'll just have to hold off for a while then start contacting them which I really hate doing, because it's like talking to a tailor's dummy - they never answer anything.

[Rob180]

An update on the passport situation. It still hasn't appeared and that's more than 6 weeks now. I used the online query form to have it returned which they say they will respond to within 10 working days. That period has passed......no response. Now I've sent a letter in the post to the Sheffield office requesting they return it. I managed to get through to the UKVI helpline and actually spoke to a human. She said write to Sheffield and request it back. She stated that passports get returned separately in case they go missing, which makes sense, then added that sometimes they forget to return the 2nd passport after returning the 1st one with the submitted documents. They forget!? Tough luck if you need to travel because someone is seriously ill or for a funeral, you won't be going. Fortunately that doesn't apply in her case but it will affect some people. They charge you over £2000 for this visa 'service' then they leave people without any means of leaving the country for nearly 2 months. Ridiculous.

 

PS: Don't phone that visa helpline from a mobile or you will get a NASTY charge like the one I got. The number is NOT free. From a landline it's about 12p a minute, but from a mobile it can be 40p a minute. For anyone that wants the number, it's 0300 123 2241.

[Rob180]

Update:  the passport has finally arrived. After I sent an email to the complaints section, complaining about the delay and informing them a copy of the letter was being sent to my MP, the passport miraculously arrived 4 working days later. It appears the fastest way to get a passport back is as follows:  1. After a reasonable amount of time which I would deem to be 2 weeks, write to them by recorded post at UKVI PO BOX 3468 Sheffield.  2. As you will probably get no answer, do the same again after another week. 3. If there's no answer to that after another week, send a complaint by email to [email protected]  telling them a copy of the letter is being sent to your MP as you have now waited for over a month and very urgently need to travel.