Settle permanently in the UK, with an Indefinite Leave to Remain application built on properly assembled evidence.
Indefinite Leave to Remain is settlement. It means you can live, work and study in the UK with no time limit and no conditions attached to your stay. For most people it is the end of a long road, and the start of British citizenship if they want it. If you are reading this, you have probably already done the hard part. You have held your visa, paid the fees, kept your job or your family together. The fear at this stage is rarely whether you qualify. It is whether you have broken something without realising. That fear is reasonable. Two things quietly undo strong settlement applications: time spent outside the UK, and a gap in your lawful status that you did not know was a gap. Both can be checked before you apply. We check them first.
This is a general guide only; we confirm your exact position at the free consultation.
A free consultation to confirm you meet the qualifying period
A detailed checklist, including a rolling absences review
Preparation of your application, with an internal review before submission
Your approval, then support with submission
Updates through to the decision
Settlement is not a reward for time served. It is a set of tests, and you have to pass all of them on the day you apply.
You need an unbroken period on a visa route that leads to settlement — the Home Office calls this your qualifying period. How long it is depends on the route you have been on, and some routes do not count towards settlement at all. You need to have stayed within the limits on time spent outside the UK. You need to show your English is good enough and pass the Life in the UK Test, unless you are exempt. And the Home Office checks your record — convictions, immigration breaches, and whether you have been honest in past applications.
The periods, the limits and the fees are set by government and they are revised. We will not print a number here that may be out of date by the time you read it. We confirm exactly what applies to your route at your free consultation, and the current rules are published on GOV.UK so you can check them yourself.
This is where most people go wrong, and it is almost always an honest mistake.
Absences are not counted per calendar year. They are counted over rolling twelve-month periods. That means every possible twelve-month window inside your qualifying period is looked at on its own. A long trip in November and another one in February sit in two different calendar years, but they fall inside the same rolling window, and that is the window that counts.
People also forget the short trips. A weekend away. A funeral abroad. Three days for work. They add up, and the Home Office can see every one of them.
Some absences may be treated differently — serious illness, a bereavement, or travel your employer required — depending on your route. That is never automatic. It has to be explained and evidenced in the application rather than assumed.
We rebuild your travel history from your passports, your stamps and your own records, then work out where you actually stand before you pay a Home Office fee. If the answer is that you should wait a few months, we will tell you to wait.
Continuous lawful residence means you always had permission to be here. Not almost always. Always.
The most common break we see is an application made after the previous visa had already expired. Not by months. By a day, or a few days. People assume there is a grace period, or that the Home Office will overlook it because everything else was in order. In residence terms, the space between the day your leave ended and the day your new application began is a gap — and a gap can reset a clock you have been building for years.
Other things that break it:
There are limited provisions for short gaps in defined circumstances. They are narrow, and they have to be argued openly in the application rather than hoped over. Hiding a gap is far worse than explaining one.
We start with your immigration history, not your paperwork. Passports, every grant of leave, any refusal, every entry and exit we can establish. The point is to find a problem while it can still be fixed, rather than after a decision.
Then we tell you one of three things. That you are ready. That you are not ready yet, and when you will be. Or that something in your history needs a specialist we are not — in which case we say so and you owe us nothing.
If you go ahead, we prepare the application and the covering letter, set the absence calculation out clearly so the caseworker does not have to work it out for themselves, and address anything awkward in your history head-on. You read and approve the whole application before it is submitted. Nothing goes to the Home Office that you have not seen.
If a British passport is the real goal, it is worth mapping both steps at once rather than discovering the second one late. See British citizenship for what comes after settlement.
Published market rates for settlement work commonly run from £1,500 to £3,500. Most firms bill by the hour, so the figure quoted when you sign is not the figure you pay at the end.
Our fee is £500. Fixed. It does not go up because your case turns out to be complicated, and it does not go up because it takes us longer than we expected. The consultation before it is free, and if that consultation ends with us telling you not to apply yet, you have still paid nothing.
You will pay the Home Office separately. There is an application fee for settlement, a charge for the Life in the UK Test if you have not taken it, an English qualification if you need one, and an optional faster decision service. All of those are set by government and all of them move, so we give you the current figures in writing before you commit rather than printing a number here that may already be wrong. Our full breakdown is on the fees page.
It depends entirely on which route or routes you have been on. Several routes lead to settlement and the qualifying periods are not the same, some routes cannot be combined, and some do not count towards settlement at all. Rather than give you a figure that may not be yours, we audit your history and tell you your earliest safe application date at the free consultation.
There is a limit on absences, and it is assessed over rolling twelve-month periods rather than calendar years. That catches people out, because two trips in different calendar years can still fall inside the same rolling window. Limits and the treatment of exceptional absences vary by route, so we calculate your actual position from your travel history instead of estimating it.
Possibly, but not certainly. A late application ends your lawful leave and can break continuous residence, which is why it matters so much. There are limited provisions for short gaps in defined circumstances. It needs assessing properly and disclosing openly in the application, never leaving out and hoping.
No. Time on routes that do not lead to settlement generally does not count, and rules on combining time from different routes are specific. This is one of the most common reasons people apply a year or two before they are actually eligible and lose the fee. We map your whole history first.
The Life in the UK Test is a computer-based test on British history, culture and government, taken at an approved centre. Once you pass it, the pass does not expire. Separately you normally need to evidence your English, though many people are exempt through their nationality or a degree taught in English. We confirm which applies to you.
Sometimes. Dependants can apply alongside you where they have completed their own qualifying period, but their eligibility is assessed separately from yours and their absences are counted separately too. It is common for one family member to be ready and another not to be.
It does not expire by time. It can lapse if you spend a long continuous period living outside the UK, and it can be revoked in limited circumstances such as deception or serious criminality. If you are planning an extended period abroad, get advice before you go rather than after.
We review the refusal notice with you and explain in plain terms what the caseworker was not satisfied about. Where a properly evidenced fresh application is realistic, we prepare it. We do not conduct appeals, administrative reviews or tribunal work, and we will say so plainly. See our visa refusal page for what to do next.
Book your free 30-minute consultation for a straightforward, honest assessment of your matter.