How to Meet the Spouse Visa Income Requirements for Visa Extension Applications, Spouse Visa Switching Applications

As part of UK family visa applications including UK Spouse visa application and UK Fiance Visa applications, the applicants and their partner must prove their income to a certain threshold to make a successful application. The Spouse Visa for UK applications include partner visa as an unmarried partner, civil partners when they have a legally registered civil partnership and married partner visa applications.

The UK financial requirements apply to all applications for visa applications made outside the UK (entry clearance applications for UK) and visa extension as a spouse inside the UK (commonly known as Further Leave to Remain in UK (FLR)). Many people referred to this visa as a marriage visa which is not correct to say as in immigration rules, there is no such visa. Though there is a category called Fiance Visa which is used to enter the UK and get married to a British Citizen or person settled in the UK. Besides financial requirements, other requirements also apply such as documents to prove available accommodation i.e Mortgage statement, Tenancy Agreement, latest utility bills and immigration home survey report.

Our 100% Success Rate for UK Family Visa Applications including UK Fiance Visa Application and UK Spouse Visa Application

Our Top Services- Types of Immigration Applications	Book Full Application Service	Success Rate	Years
Spouse Visa Extension/ Switch Applications	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Fiance Visa Applications	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Fee Waiver Applications	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Parent Route Visa Extension -FLR	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Naturalisation (British Citizenship Applications)	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR)	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Skilled Worker Visa (Tier 2 General)	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Dependent Children- Leave to Enter & Visa Extension	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Dependent Children- Indefinite Leave to Enter (ILE)	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date
Employer Sponsor Licence	Add to Basket	100%	2006 to date

Minimum income requirement for UK Partner Visas including Fiance Visa to get married in UK and Spouse Visa for UK

For a partner to join their husband or wife in UK, the UK sponsor must have an annual income of at least £29000 per year. For employment income, gross amount is considered. The gross income is before deduction of income tax and national insurance.

Income requirement for dependent children of spouse -applying at same time or later- Pre 11 April 2024 applications

In addition to the £18600 income requirement, for the first child applying to join parents in the UK, the £3800 is required. For the second child, income requirements of £2400 will apply.

For example, if the wife is applying for a spouse visa with two children. They need to provide an annual income of:
Income Requirement for Wife: £18600
Income Requirement for first child: £3800
Income Requirement for second child: £2400
Total Income Requirement = £24800

Income Requirement for children who are British Citizen or have Permanent Residence in UK

For the purposes of income requirement, children who are British citizens or have ILR (Indefinite Leave to Remain in UK) or who are EEA citizens are ignored. No income is required for them.

Allowed sources to meet the income for financial requirement of UK Fiance Visa & Spouse visa

Income can be proved from employment (permanent or temporary such as agency work), self employment, director of company in UK, savings over £16000 for £18600/ year income requirement or £16500 for £29,000 a year income requirement, rental income from commercial or residential property, income from company dividends. Savings may be held in investment account. The income requirements can be met through savings alone if the UK sponsor or the applicant have savings £62500 or £88500 for income requirements £18600 and £29000 respectively.

Documents required for UK spouse visa income requirements, Income from employment or business to meet financial requirement for UK fiance and spouse visa applications

The required list of documents to prove income to meet financial requirements will vary, depending on the source of income and whether you are combining two or more sources to meet the requirement. For employment income, job must be held for at least six months with same employer. The employment to meet the income requirement for UK partenr visa can be salaried employment or non-salaried employment. Remeber, rules to calculate the anncal income to meet the financial (minimum income) are different for salaried employment and hourly rate paid employment. Also, for variable income, the yearly income may be calcualted in more than one ways.

Remember, the exact list of required documents may vary depending on individual circumstances and the combination of income sources. It’s always best to consult the latest guidelines or seek professional advice to ensure compliance with the current immigration rules.

The general list of documents for income from employment is given below:

Salary Slips for the last 6-12 months depending on many factors such as length of employment, monthly income, income in the last 6 months or last 12 months.
Bank statements for the same period as above showing income received in bank account
A letter from employer issued within 30 days of making of visa or FLR application.
P60 of recent financial year
A signed Employment contract
Other related documents to prove income and employment, depending on the circumstances, may vary from case to case basis.

Spouse visa and Fiance Visa financial requirement- Income from self-employment such as sole traders, partnership firms

The required list of documents to prove income to meet financial requirements for a UK partner visa will vary, depending on whether income is from one financial year or a combination of the last two years. The list of documents, for income from self-employment, to meet the financial requirements for spouse visa, is given below:

• Proof of Registration with HMRC
• SA302 or SA300 often referred as Tax Calculations from HMRC
• Invoices for the recent full financial and tax year
• Recent Tax Return for the last full financial and tax year (6 April to 5 April)
• Partnership tax return for most recent ended tax year
• Bank statements for the same financial year as per the tax return
• Letter from an accountant who is member of a professional bodies in UK confirming the authenticity, and audit of the accounts and confirming the income
• Evidence of tax paid and payable to HMRC
• Proof of continuity of the business such as a recent business bank statement or an invoice

Video transcription on UK Spouse Visa Financial Requirements

Hello I am Naveed Mukhtar from ZR Visas. We are an Immigration Advice firm Since 2006, have clients in more than 60 countries. We are family Visa specialist, have 100% success rate in many UK Visa applications including UK fiance visa applications, UK spouse visa extension and switching applications, British Nationality Applications, Indefinite Leave to Remain, UK Sponsor License Applications, Skilled Worker Visa and Dependents Applications and a lot more. You can see our work on our success stories page on ZRVisas.com. We have hundreds of five star reviews on Google, Trustpilot, Facebook and Yell, just search ‘ZR Visas’ to find how we are helping clients around the world.

In this video, we will talk about the new Financial Requirements introduced by the Home Office recently. A lot of people have been asking questions and trying to understand how the changes will impact them and what will happen if they made their application before the changes and what is the current threshold and what will be the income requirements by end of the year and during the next year 2025. Starting from the current requirements for UK fiance visa application and UK spouse visa application, the current income threshold has been increased from £18,600 to 29,000 a year. Partner visa applications for those who are joining their partner from abroad over on or after 11th of April 2024 or they are making a switching application from a different Visa route to partner visa application, they will need to meet the new income criteria for income requirement that is £29,000 a year.

If you or your partner are in receipt of certain disability benefits such as Personal Independence Payment (PIP) or Carer Allowances or other disability benefits then you may be exempt from meeting the financial requirements. Different immigration rules will apply and you will have to meet sufficient accommodation and maintenance requirements to make a successful UK fiance and spouse visa applications.

Now, let’s talk about how you can meet the financial requirements if you are employed. You will need your last 6 to 12 months pay slips and bank statement to prove your income. The gross amount will be taken into account to calculate your annual income. When we say a grass amount it means the highest amount shown on your payslip before deduction of National Insurance and tax. Depending on your circumstances you may need to provide 6 to 12 months’ payslips with corresponding bank statements and a letter from an employer to confirm that you have earned that amount.

When we talk about self-employment, there are two different ways of being self-employed: one is you are a Sole Trader. And in that case, most likely, your financial year will start from 6th of April and will end on 5th of April next year. In that case, you will need to provide your most recent tax return for the year which has recently ended. It does not matter whether you have filed the tax return for that tax year or not but the home office will expect if the financial year has ended recently, the Home Office expect that you do file your tax return and provide the corresponding accounts letter from the accountant and related bank statements for the whole duration as your financial year.

The second mode of being self-employed is when people are directors of a company and in some cases, they are the sole director of the company and they are taking their salary or dividends from the company in return for the work they’re doing. The visa rules are complex; they are not as simple as compared to employment and self-employment.

These are not the only sources which you can use if you have some other income such as a rental income or you are in receipt of pension income. You can also combine these sources in some circumstances but remember not all the sources of income can be combined. Therefore it is better to get professional visa advice when you are thinking of joining two or more sources of income to meet Financial requirements.

I will say, the strict criteria applies to documents and evidence. The home office will need it as a part of the application, therefore it’s important that you provide the documents in prescribed format and the exact documents that you need.

Another other way of meeting the financial requirement for a partner visa is if you have a substantial amount of savings. We have details on the financial requirements on our spouse visa and fiance visa page at zrvisas.com, you can see that. We will keep our website updated for the latest updates on income requirements.

Now we talk about the people who submitted their UK visa application before 11th of April 2024. If you submit your application before 11th of April 2024, in that case, the immigration rules in place at the time of your original application will apply. This will be the same for UK spouse visa extension and for indefinite leave to remain (ILR) applications. If you are not sure, please consult a regulated immigration advice firm, like us, who can help you to understand which income threshold will apply to you.

We do provide a ‘Full Application Service’ for a Fixed Fee for UK Fiance Visa, Spouse Visa and all other UK Visa applications. And we have some of the Best Success Rate (100% for UK Fiance, Spouse Visa Extension & Switching) and you can see our work on our website at ZR vas.com at the success stories page. Our professional visa team of Immigration Firm can help you to do your visa application and can also provide additional support and can do urgent UK visa applications without any additional cost to you. We hope you have a better understanding of UK Immigration Rules now.

The income requirement is going to change by the end of the year, that’s what the home office has announced. Home Office announced that income threshold will increase to £34,500 by end of 2024 and by the start of next year 2025, the income threshold is likely to go at £ 38,700. We don’t know exactly when these changes will be implemented as the Home Office has not announced the dates yet but we will update our website as soon as we have the latest updates. You can visit our UK fiance visa and spouse visa pages to stay updated.

You can also follow us on Social Media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and we post over work and latest updates regularly. We do provide services to all clients around the world using phone, email, WhatsApp, post, Microsoft teams, Google Drive and a lot of other modern means we use to facilitate our clients around the world. Thank you very much for watching the video and should you need any assistance, please feel free to contact us.

Our contact details can be found on our website. We wish you all the best and we hope that for the new changes, you can meet the new income criteria for your next Fiance and Spouse Visa applications. If you need help and support, please contact the team.

Unable to Meet Financial Requirements due to Covid-19

Many people have been furlough by their employers, a lot of self-employed lot their income in the pandemic. This has caused many people unable to meet the financial requirements to apply for visa or extend stay. UK government paid 80 percent of the salary is paid to the employees. For the purpose of meeting spouse visa financial requirement, Home Office will counted as if employee received 100% of their salary or pay. Income received via the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme or the Coronavirus Self Employment Income Support Scheme can count as employment or self-employment income for the period 1 March 2020 to 31 October 2021. In the tax return, this should not be mentioned as a business profits. HMRC has updated the tax return and introduced a section in the tax return where applicants can enter the income from the income support scheme. Once tax return is complete, tax calculations will show the added up figure for business profits and support amount.

We recommend to get professional immigration advice to find out the options you may have to extend the stay. Not only we provide personal visa advice after taking into consideration of your circumstances. Our team of expert immigration advisers is in hand to work out the alternative assessment options you may have and on how to extend your stay in UK.

Read our FAQs about Spouse Visa and Extension Applications

You might also like:

Spouse Visa

Fiance Visa

Permanent Residence-ILR

British Nationality

Interested in reading other requirements of spouse visa

English Language Requirement for UK Visas

Spouse visa extension UK Applications Top 50 Questions

Proof of living together for Spouse Visa, ILR Applications