Went to get my wife's English test certificate on Saturday. Seems it's invalid, because it's the NOCN B1 Exam instead of the Cambridge B1 Exam. The NOCN B1 is, apparently, valid for Citizenship and ILR until November, but NOT for FLR(M). Or so they said at the centre, anyway. I only found this out because the date on the certificate was later than the date it was taken and was after April 6, so I queried it. Not too impressed, actually, because when I phoned them previously the woman said this was the test we needed, and I thought the information provided by them was not clear. So, anyway, if you're applying for a fiance or spouse visa before November 5, just check you don't have an NOCN B1 certificate. The upshot of this is we need to do another English test!!! But, actually, it's not a bad thing really. It takes away the tight 3 day window we had for applying, so we'll probably do a postal application now which will actually save money in the long term. I now see why they did, and support, the new method of English testing as it takes away any confusion and also shuts out these rather shoddy language school. The website for tests is here: http://www.trinitycollege.com/findaseltcentre/ I had a look through it and it's quite good. It gives a clear indication of what test to do, and lets you book it. So we now will be taking an A1 test - as FLR(M) defaults to that. Which, apparently takes 6 minutes and will be a complete doddle for the missus. Only disadvantage is that some people will need to travel a bit to do it. We need to go to London, which is about 50 miles. But I reckon it's a good system.
Such English Test mayhem. Its been a shambles since we first started looking at them back in July 2011.
Yeah. To be fair, I think the new system does sort it out a bit. Some of these old test centres are a bit dubious it seems. It frustrated me at the time, but I can see now why they've done what they have by having appointed centres. It's only by chance that we found out we'd done the wrong test.
My wife just took and passed the IELTS Life Skills A1 test in Cebu with IDP; that is for her Spouse Visa. I had tried to book the test with the British Council in Cebu but there were so many problems booking on their website that I gave up and used IDP instead. IELTS is jointly owned by the British Council, IDP, IELTS Australia and Cambridge English Language Assessment. I think the new arrangements since April 6th this year are much better and the requirement to take fingerprints means those taking the test can be matched with the biometrics supplied when a Visa is applied for (but I don't know if this is done routinely) It does cost a lot more for these 'secure' tests but it should help to cut down on immigration fraud. All the approved test centres in the UK and overseas are listed here... https://www.gov.uk/government/uploa...lish_language_tests_and_test_centres_v3_0.pdf
