My girlfriends UK partner Visa got approved today for the first 2.5 years So just wanted to check that to take holidays over to Europe she still needs to apply for the Schengen visa right? I get the gist that it should be sort of auto approved now she has a UK resident visa so can we be a bit vague on where we might go ? I mean in the sense we'd like to pop over to France for long weekends and Portugal/Italy for the odd week quite often so and I assume we don't apply for a Schengen visa every weekend trip or do we ?
I can't answer your question (I'm sure someone on here can help) but, be aware, any time they spend outside the UK will be added onto their 5-/10-year visa route!
Ok I will look into that more. My understanding was that she can be outside the UK for 6 months a year with no effect on the 5 year visa route..... Any other things to consider over these 5 years ?
Time spent outside the UK is not added on to your visa durations, it is an amount of days that can not be exceeded away from the UK in a given period only.
You are right it is the Schengen visa there are various rules as to which country to apply to depending on your travel arrangements.
Do you know how many days in a period she is allowed to be outside the UK during this 5 year visa time ?
There are a number of immigration categories where it is possible to qualify for indefinite leave to remain ILR after 5 years. Some of these categories include a requirement to spend not more than 180 days outside the UK in any 12 month period during the 5 years. Then with regards your application for Schengen visa i believe that you have to apply through the country that you first intend to visit ie, if France is your first port of call then you need to apply via the French Embassy if its Spain then its the Spanish Embassy and so on and so forth. https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/how-to-apply-schengen-visa/
have a look here https://assets.publishing.service.g...45/calculating-continuous-period-v22.0ext.pdf also on schengen visas dont forget you can only spend a rolling 90 days in a rolling 180 days in the Schengen area
