Who can apply?

Under the Immigration law, the eligibility requirements for applying for leave to remain through a private life route are mainly divided into the following according to the applicant's age and duration of stay.

• You are under 18 and you’ve lived in the UK continuously for at least seven years, and it would be “unreasonable” to expect you to leave the UK.

• You are between 18 and 24 years old and you’ve lived continuously in the UK for more than half your life.

• You are 18 years old or over and you have spent less than 20 years in the UK and would face very significant problems living in the country you’d have to go to if not allowed to stay in the UK.

• You are 25 years old or over and you have lived in the UK continuously for 20 years.

The amendment announced on March 15, 2022, also included a new category for dependent children born in the UK in the Private Life route. This is for children born in the UK who are not eligible for permission to stay or for settlement on the Private Life route in their own right (for instance, because they have not lived in the UK for at least 7 years) and who apply as dependents of their parents, who themselves are or have last been on the Private Life route. The new changes will take effect on June 20, 2022.

In order to apply for permission to stay on a private life route, you must provide evidence that you will not be able to overcome the "very difficult obstacles" that the applicant faces when moving country. For example, it may be a common obstacle, such as learning a new language or finding a job, but an example of a "very important problem" can usually be "unable to be educated because you do not speak a language."

The requirement to apply for permission to Stay

To apply for permission to stay on the Private Life route, you must meet the following conditions.

Validity Requirements

The use of the specified form is one of the validation requirements.

Other validation requirements include payment of application fees and Immigration Health Surcharge, provision of biometric information, provision of passport or travel documents, and being in the UK on the date of application.

Applications that do not meet all validity requirements will be invalid and may be rejected without being considered. This effectively does not have the right to appeal against rejection, so it is very important to ensure that the validity requirements are met prior to applying.

Suitability Requirements

There are “suitability” requirements to meet the criteria for these private life applications, meaning that criminal convictions, “bad character”, poor immigration history or unpaid NHS debts could disqualify you.

It is possible to apply “outside of the rules” in long residence/private life applications if you cannot meet the suitability requirements, but it is hard to succeed in applications outside of the immigration rules.

Continuity of Residence

Previously, immigration rules allowed people to apply for Indefinite Leave to remain if they could show that they had been in the UK for 14 years continuously. The current immigration rules require 20 years’ continuous residence if some or all of that residence was not “lawful”. If your application is successful you will be granted leave to remain for 2.5 years, and will then need to have four periods of this before applying for Indefinite Leave to Remain under the 10 years long residence settlement route.

If you have been jailed during your stay in the UK, you cannot count the time spent in prison as 20 years spent in the UK, but it does not break the period of continuous residence. You can use the time you spent in the UK before you spent in prison, and add it to the time you spent in the UK after you were released from prison.

If you have lived for more than 20 years without a proper visa, it may be difficult to provide formal evidence that you have lived for more than 20 years. The UKVI recognizes official documents certifying residence in the UK, such as utility bills, but may not always be able to provide these documents. It's also important to find out who can provide a statement to evidence your presence in the UK. According to the Home Office guideline, you are required to present documents covering every 12 months period of the 20 years. If you do not provide evidence that applies every year for 20 years, your application is likely to be refused.

Is the application for permission to stay successful?

If you are successful in your application, you will be granted permission to stay for two and a half years.

You can extend your stay and if approved, you will be granted an additional 2.5 years of stay.

After ten years – that is, 4 x 2.5 years’ leave to remain – you will be able to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain.

"If you are 18-24 years old, 18-25 years old or younger and have stayed in the UK for more than half of your life, your ILR will be reduced from 10 years (Home Office announced a concession in October 2021) and you can apply for settlement after 5 years of private life.

Conditions of stay

During your stay on a private life route, you will typically not receive public funds, such as welfare benefits or homelessness support. You would need to demonstrate exceptional circumstances to have this “no recourse to public funds” restriction lifted.

If your application is refused, you may have the right to appeal the decision.