Urgent visa help in Glasgow

By Alexander Boyd Immigration solicitor · Alexander Boyd Solicitors, Glasgow

Your visa runs out next week. A Home Office letter has given you ten days to send documents. Your appeal window is Thursday. Whatever's brought you here, the clock is the problem and you want a real solicitor to look at it fast.

Here's what we do. Book through our calendar and you'll usually be sitting with a qualified immigration solicitor within 24 hours. £175 including VAT, 30 minutes, in person at our Glasgow office or by video. After the call you'll know which option fits your case, what the next step costs as a fixed fee, and how to act on your deadline. The rest of this page is to help you make the most of the time you have before the call.

Step one: find your deadline

This sounds obvious. It isn't. The date you need isn't always where you'd expect.

On a decision letter

The line you want is near the back. It usually reads "you must apply by..." or "your leave to remain ends on...". The date there is the one that counts.

On a Home Office further information request

The deadline is on page one, often phrased as "you have until [date] to provide the following". Calendar days, not working days, unless the letter says otherwise.

On a refusal letter

The appeal deadline sits in the rights-of-appeal section near the back. In-country appeals are usually 14 calendar days from the date the decision was sent. Out-of-country appeals are 28 calendar days. Asylum has its own clock.

On a BRP

The expiry date is printed on the card, but it isn't always the same as your leave-to-remain expiry. Always cross-check the BRP against the most recent Home Office decision letter.

On a sponsor licence revocation notice

Your 60-day grace period starts from the date the sponsor's licence is revoked, not the date you find out about it. People often lose a week of the window before they even read the news.

Write the deadline on the front of every letter in pen. Sounds basic. Stops you misreading the date later when you're tired.

Step two: understand Section 3C leave

An in-time application keeps your existing visa alive while the Home Office decides. The law calls this Section 3C leave. While it's running, you keep the same right to work and the same right to rent you had before.

If your application is even one day late, you don't get Section 3C leave. Your visa has expired. You're an overstayer until a decision is made. Employers and landlords are legally required to check status, and many will end the contract or the tenancy when they find out, even if they like you.

The fix is simple in principle. Apply before the deadline, even if the application isn't perfect. You can add evidence after. You can't undo overstaying.

Step three: name the deadline in front of you

These are the five we see most weeks in our Glasgow office:

Visa expiring within 28 days

Skilled worker, student, partner, parent, ten-year private life route, any of them. Sometimes the person has been waiting on a document that never came. Sometimes they didn't realise the date.

Home Office further information request

The caseworker wants more documents. Payslips, bank statements, a marriage certificate, sometimes a fresh biometric appointment. Deadlines are short, usually 10 to 14 days. Miss it and they decide without the documents.

Appeal deadline after a refusal

14 calendar days in-country, 28 calendar days out. The clock starts the day the decision was sent, often before you opened the email.

Ukraine Permission Extension

The 28-day window opens 28 days before your current Ukraine Scheme leave ends. People miss this one because they don't realise the window has opened.

Sponsor licence revocation

60 days from the date the licence is revoked. We see this most often where a smaller employer has had a Home Office compliance visit and lost the licence quietly. The worker only finds out later, by email or word of mouth.

If you've already missed the deadline

It isn't always over.

The Immigration Rules contain a 14-day exception. Where someone applies within 14 days of their leave ending and gives a good reason for the delay, the application can still be treated as in-time. Bereavement, hospitalisation, postal failure, immigration adviser misconduct, serious family emergencies, all of these have worked.

Beyond 14 days, the route gets narrower. Sometimes a fresh application from outside the UK is the cleanest fix, even though it feels like a step backwards. Sometimes a human rights claim is the right route. In a narrow set of cases, a judicial review of the Home Office's refusal to consider the application is what's needed.

Which of these fits your case is what a consultation answers. Don't decide on your own.

Step four: pull the documents together before the call

The consultation moves faster if these are in front of you:

The original visa decision and any subsequent Home Office letters.

Your passport and BRP.

The letter or notice that contains the deadline. The envelope too, where you have it, because the postmark sometimes matters.

Evidence of why a delay happened, if there was one. Medical letters, postal tracking, anything dated.

For partner or family cases, evidence of the relationship. Photos, tenancy agreements with both names, joint bank statements, messages. Quality over quantity.

For skilled workers, the Certificate of Sponsorship and recent payslips. For students, the CAS and the most recent letter from the university.

Packages people in your situation usually use

After the consultation, if the route is clear, the next step is a fixed-fee package. Every package fee includes VAT and is per person. The most common ones for deadline-driven cases:

Further Leave to Remain – £1,299

For most in-country extensions of family and private life leave. Further Leave to Remain package.

Skilled Worker Visa – £1,499

New applications and extensions. Skilled Worker Visa package.

UK Family Visas – £1,449

Spouse, partner and family extension or settlement. UK Family Visas package.

PBS Dependant Visa – £1,499

Partner or child of a Points-Based System visa holder. PBS Dependant package.

First-tier Tribunal Appeal – £1,999

Where the refusal carries a right of appeal and you're inside the 14-day window. First-tier Tribunal Appeal package.

Fee Waiver Package – £840

For human-rights-based applications where you can't afford the Home Office fee and the Immigration Health Surcharge upfront. Fee Waiver package.

Home Office filing fees are extra and paid directly to the Home Office.

How to book

Pick a slot in the Calendly link. Most consultations are bookable inside 24 hours, evening and weekend slots usually available.

Book your consultation →

If you can't find a slot that works, email info@abimmigrationlaw.co.uk and we'll find one. Phone is 0141 237 3137. The full list of services, packages and prices is on Alexander Boyd Solicitors.

People often arrive at our door embarrassed about how close to the wire they've left things. Most urgent cases come to us this way.

Common questions