OT: Any One Know A Good Lawyer

any one know of any good lawyers that speicalize in immigration?

Try your local "Law Centre".....usually plenty of immigration advice there and free I think!.

citizens advise bureau good for old ladies and advise on knitting they do have a legal dept as i recall you may have to head to central london to one of the bigger branches

think there is a big one near baker st tube, i had to go there when i had grief with counsil tax stuff. people were nice but it took along time to sort anything

Don't know them but....

http://www.gryklaw.com/

seeing as how im in nyc now my local cab or law center is a bit of a trip... thanks any ways..

Sorry for not following your movements more closely, I really should have known!....Citizens advice do have a website though and no doubt there will be some kind of web presence for some kind of association of law centres too...

Have you met a New Yawker you want to bring back already?

or do you need immigration advice for going "into" the states?

is not our very own alex a lawyer????

winston, me being a USAican wants to marry english girlfreind (yes every one i know will be invited... and no i dont know when it will happen)

congratulations....

my dad married and American lady, as far as I can remember he chose to remain a "resident alien" for some years so as to avoid paying U.S. tax on his periods of work back in UK.

vegansdontneedgears winston, me being a USAican wants to marry english girlfreind (yes every one i know will be invited... and no i dont know when it will happen)

I have a friend who married an American Girl and they're living in London now. She was already living there though having been to uni there and then sponsored in her job. Now she is free to be in the UK as she pleases.

I don't know if they even used a lawyer (we call them solicitors here). Another friend married an Ozzie. Again now living in London. Not sure if they used a "lawyer" either.

Although both married in America and Australia respectively as its apparently easier to do it and claim residency than to do it in the UK.

If I marry gf (who's EU living in London) do I score an EU passport?

EU passports don't exist. You'd possibly get a passport for her country of origin which being as its in the EU should (in theory) give you the same privileges as the rest of us in the EU.

Yeah, I meant her country of origin but what about those EU id cards which you can use instead of a passport (I think)?

news to me. But then I'm from the UK. We don't really consider ourselves a part of the EU (even though we are). We're an island nation, geographically and in so many other ways. I think if you presented someone in the UK with a EU card they'd declare it a fake and laugh at you.

Sorry.

Cardenger!

*Today, 13 EU Member States, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, plus Norway and Iceland fully apply the provisions of the Schengen acquis.

The ten new EU Member States, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia, are not yet fully-fledged members of the Schengen area, since the border controls between the new Member States and the current members of the Schengen area are maintained until the EU Council decides that the conditions for abolishing internal border controls have been met. However, since the date of accession they do apply parts of the Schengen acquis, in particular in the area of police and judicial cooperation and of external border control.

EU Member States still outside the Schengen area are the UK and Ireland which have chosen to maintain border controls with other EU Member States (although they have been authorised to apply some of the provisions on police and judicial co-operation in criminal matters).

Also Switzerland has decided to join the Schengen area. This means that border checks on individuals will disappear in some years. Switzerland will have the same associate status as Norway and Iceland which are also not members of the EU.*

http://ec.europa.eu/youreurope/nav/en/citizens/travelling/schengen-area/index.html#23297_3

Guess that's why the ID cards aren't much use here.

My advice is to get married in the states and then apply at your nearest UK embassy/console for your residency/working visa for the UK. You'll get a provisional working visa that entitles you to reside in the UK but without access to public funds - after behaving yourself for two years you can then change it to a permanent resident visa.

Its pretty straightforward. My wife had hers processed in Chicago the next day (after we hit a snafu applying in the UK).

If you want to get married in the UK, you'll need to apply for a fiance visa to legally enter the country and get married (you cannot work on this visa). You can then apply to the Home Office to convert it to a working visa. The conversion can be done in person at the Home Office if your case is straightforward or by mail if they need more supporting info (can take up to 11 weeks). However, from friends and family we spoke to, applying in your home country esp if you're american is always much faster.

If you were already resident in the UK, you'd have to apply for permission to marry from the Home Office which strips all the fun out of it (as well as taking up to three months).

If you need any help/or have questions I'm happy to help as we went through this two years ago (my wife is American).

There are many sites that have useful information out there but I remember seeing some helpful replies here:
http://www.easyexpat.com/forums/forum_47.htm

And this has all the info you could want:
http://www.ukvisas.gov.uk/servlet/Front?pagename=OpenMarket/Xcelerate/ShowPage&c=Page&cid=1018721067257