Understand the eligibility of ILR
Recently, the long residency route (10 years of legal residence) to Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) has gained more attention than normal, partially because of the number of refusals that the Home Office has given to hopefuls applying under this path. It would seem that this is due to a clear misconception of what constitutes a continuous residence period in the UK – the basic component of an application under the long-stay regulations. No less critical understands how to break the continuous-time. Anyone who wishes to apply for ILR on various visas after having been in the UK for 10 years would logically consider applying under the long residency route. However, anyone considering this option must ensure that they have never spent more than 6 months outside the United Kingdom, or a total of 18 months outside the United Kingdom over the entire 10-year continuous period. Since the Home Office describes a month as 30 days, this will translate into no more than 180 days at any given time...