Walking in the Footsteps of Your Ancestors: How to Obtain a UK Ancestry Visa

Citizens of Commonwealth nations often have grandparents who were born in the UK. It was common for migration both to and from the UK to occur within the former British Empire. If such circumstances apply to you, there is a chance you can walk in your grandparents’ footsteps with a UK Ancestry visa.

This visa allows you to live, work, and study in the UK for up to five years. Read this article to learn the requirements and documentation you need to provide to obtain this visa, and the application process you must follow.

Ancestry Visa Key Requirements

Before you apply for the Ancestry visa, you will need to prove that you meet its key requirements. These are as follows:

• You are 17 or older.
• You can support yourself and any dependents joining you financially without needing public funds.
• You plan to work in the UK.
• You meet the citizenship and ancestry requirements (detailed below).

To apply, you must be a commonwealth citizen, British overseas citizen, British overseas territories citizen, British national (overseas), or a citizen of Zimbabwe.

Not all individuals from these nations will be eligible for the Ancestry visa. You also need to have a grandparent born in the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands, or the Isle of Man. The grandparent can also be born in the Republic of Ireland on or before 31 March 1922, or have been born on a British-registered ship or aircraft.

The final ancestry that counts for this visa is if you or your parent was adopted or born in the UK. This can be within or outside marriage. However, you can never access the Ancestry visa via a step-relation.

Ancestry Visa Required Documentation

Like all UK visas, you will need to provide plenty of documentation with your application to prove that you meet the eligibility requirements. These are as follows:

• A valid passport or travel document.
• Birth certificates for yourself and the UK-born grandparent.
• Evidence of plans to work in the UK, such as a job offer or a business plan for self-employment.
• A bank statement showing sufficient funds.
• Proof of relationship with any dependents joining you.
• Marriage papers of your parents or grandparents.

You will also need to provide adoption papers or evidence of any legal name changes if relevant. Finally, individuals coming from high tuberculosis risk nations will need to provide a TB test.

Completing Your Ancestry Visa Application

Once you have confirmed your eligibility and have gathered your paperwork, you can apply for the ancestry visa online by following the step-by-step process below:

1. Complete the online application form on the Home Office website.
2. Submit copies of your documentation.
3. Pay the application fee.
4. Book a biometric appointment at your nearest visa application centre (VAC).
5. Attend the appointment, where you will submit your fingerprints and a biometric photograph.
6. Wait for the application to be processed and receive your decision.

Application Fee and Processing Time

For your visa to be processed, you will need to pay the standard £637 application fee. A further fee can be paid for priority processing, allowing you to receive a decision within a few days. The immigration health surcharge will also need to be paid upfront, allowing you to receive care from the National Health Service.

In most cases, you will need to wait around three weeks for the Ancestry visa to be processed, unless you decide to pay for priority processing. You could experience delays if there are issues with your application.

What to Do if the Application is Refused?

If there are significant issues with your application or the Home Office believes that you are not eligible, your application may be refused. This couldv be because you aren’t a citizen of an eligible Commonwealth country, you can’t prove your ancestry, or you fail to prove you will be actively seeking work once in the UK.

The Ancestry visa does not come with an automatic right of appeal. You can request an administrative review of the decision, or reapply having fixed the issues with your application. It may also be worth considering if a different visa option, such as a Work visa, will be more appropriate for you to come to the UK.

Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) After your Ancestry Visa

One of the reasons that the Ancestry visa is such a popular route is that is frequently a pathway to ILR. This immigration status allows you to remain in the UK permanently, and can become a pathway to citizenship.

In order to be eligible for ILR after being an Ancestry visa holder, you need to have had continuous residence in the UK for at least five years. During this time, you must not have been outside the UK for over 180 days in anty given 12 month period. You also need to continue to meet the Ancestry visa requirements by still being a citizen of a commonwealth nation. Finally, if you are aged 18-64, you must have passed the Life in the UK test.

The application can be completed online. Make sure that it has been completed within 28 days of your five year residency period having been completed.

How Can IAS Help?

The most important aspect of the Ancestry visa is to work out if your heritage makes you eligible. Our team of immigration lawyers at Immigration Advice Service can help you to do the investigative work to track down family history documentation that you can use as evidence during your application.

We can then help you to put together a watertight application, ensuring that all your documentation is valid. We will then send off your application with a Letter of Representation that highlights the application’s strengths to Home Office officials.

Our support doesn’t stop once you have arrived in the UK. You can reconnect with us if you decide to upgrade your ancestry visa to ILR status. We can also help if you decide to apply for British citizenship by naturalisation.

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