Immigration
Chattertons are able to advise and assist on all areas of immigration law for the
private client.
To read what our clients have to say about our immigration services click here.
We can offer you a free consultation by telephone call limited to 20 minutes per matter, for expert advice call 01205 310025 and ask to speak to our immigration experts.
Our Immigration Law team has a number of years of extensive experience behind them. We can advise on applications for:
- European free movement (that is for citizens of countries within the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland and their family members (who may not be EEA or Swiss citizens themselves)) including: residence cards, registration certificates, permanent residence, family member residence stamps (FMRS), applications under the Worker Registration Scheme (WRS) and family permits,
- Indefinite leave to remain (ILR) (otherwise called Settlement),
- Extensions of limited leave to remain,
- Right of Abode,
- Visas for visitors (whether those visitors be general, business, sports, entertainer or special visitors), or
- If you wish to work, study or join family in the UK.
We also provide services to those who wish to come to the UK under: Tiers 1 (Highly Skilled Worker, Entrepreneur, Investor and Post-study Worker), and Tier 2 (Skilled Worker, Intra-company Transfer Worker, Minister of Religion and Sports Person) of the new Points Based System (‘PBS’) (formerly the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme (HSMP) and Work Programme Scheme, also known as the Work Permit Scheme). We can also advise: Students under Tier 4 PBS and Temporary Sponsored Workers (creative and sporting workers, charity workers, religious workers, government authorized exchange workers, international agreement workers and workers under a youth mobility scheme) under Tier 5 PBS. We can also advise company sole representatives.
We are also able to advise employers (Sponsors) looking to employ non-UK residents. If you are an Employer, you should visit our Business Immigration webpage in our Business Services section for more information.
We can advise spouses (husbands and wives), civil partners, fiancées and unmarried partners of people present and settled in the UK as to their stay in the UK and the stay of their dependants (usually children) within that relationship.
We can also advise on naturalisation (that is British Citizenship) of individuals as British Citizens whether it be on the basis of marriage or residence or applications from commonwealth citizens with UK ancestry.
If you are not sure under what route you can come to the UK or remain in the UK, then we are able to review your options with you and explain the routes available to you.
We provide a service to advise you on what is required and what supporting evidence is needed to make your application, whether you are making that application from within or outside the UK. This includes advising you as to the likely prospects of success and also of the drawbacks to your application. We can take you through the process step by step, by helping you to prepare and submit your application. In terms of immigration status, it can be a case of stepping blocks until your status is ‘no longer subject to immigration control,’ we are pleased to say that most of our clients stay with us for advice right from first entering the UK, to obtaining Indefinite Leave to Remain and or British Citizenship (Naturalisation).
We are also able to provide a service advising you as to any right of appeal that you may have before The First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) and/or the Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber. These are new chambers, which replace the former Asylum and Immigration Tribunal, (the AIT). We can advise you about your appeal, whether you are making that appeal from within or outside the UK. To read about Chattertons’ recent success stories relating to appeals click here.
If you wish to Sponsor a migrant to come to the UK then we can also advise you about this and help you prepare the paperwork that you will need to send to the applicant, to form part of their application.
We can also prepare Parental Travel authorization documentation (otherwise referred to as: Letter of Authorisation / Child Travel consent form / Letter for international travel authorization / Parent Authorisation letter for minors), for children to travel abroad without both of their birth parents or legal parents accompanying them. This authorization may also be required where other family members or friends may be travelling with your child. There are different requirements for what this documentation must contain depending on your nationalities and the country/countries to which your children will be travelling to and from. We can also witness your signatures to this document, and we can also sign it as well, as solicitors.
We can also advise you where your property and/or goods have been seized by HM Customs and Excise / HM Revenue and Customs. This may include your vehicle. It is important that if you want your property and or goods returned to you, that you correspond with the Home Office as soon as possible, failure to do so, within a limited period of time (usually 30 days), could mean that your vehicle and goods will be disposed of. Depending on the circumstances, we can help you to appeal against the legality of the seizure, and/or ask them to return your property to you even if you accept that HMRC had a legal right to seize the items (this is called restoration).
We can also advise you if you are travelling abroad to purchase goods, when going through customs when entering the UK, what you are allowed and not allowed to bring in, and what you can bring in before you have to pay duty tax and or tax on it. What you can bring in will vary depending on where you are traveling from. We can also advise you on the quantities of items where the authorities may be concerned that your use of those goods may be for commercial purposes, rather than personal.
We pride ourselves on being different to our competitors, as we offer a very personal and friendly service, offering you individual and tailored advice and solutions depending on what your own individual needs and requirements are, we appreciate that everyone’s circumstances and needs are different. We will try our best to solve any problems and concerns. We are able to offer a very competitive price for our expert services.
We are able to offer a translator who can speak Russian and Latvian. However, our immigration team have advised individuals from all over the world, and arrangements can be made if English is not your or the applicants preferred medium of communication.
Our solicitors in the Immigration team are members of the ILPA — The Immigration Law Practitioners' Association.
We welcome referrals from other law firms or other bodies who are not able to offer legal advice.
We are also able to prepare or swear affidavits or affirmations. We are also able to certify your immigration documents and paperwork.
We are English lawyers, and so we are not able to advise you as to the immigration process and systems in other countries if you wish to emigrate from the UK, we can only advise you about UK immigration.
Useful Website Addresses
Contact Us
For further information or advice on Immigration, please e-mail
immigration@chattertons.com or contact a member of our Immigration team
on one of the numbers given below.
Immigration Team