₦airaland Forum

b31164707:
Big congratulations! I just recently secured a 6-month visa myself and was wondering if I could go from a 6-month visa to a 5-year tourist visa without applying for a 2-year visa first. So you can actually apply for a 5-year tourist visa without first of all applying for a 2-year tourist visa? Did you submit bank statements for the most recent three- or six-month period?

Yes, you can > I just made the argument that i intend to be travelling more frequently going forward (for exploration and to see family) and want to avoid the hassle of having to renew frequently.

I submitted bank statements for 4 months (wanted to submit for 3 but needed to show salary increase in the 4th month).

Other documents submitted included:
Employment and salary review letters
Payslips
Proof of investments (mutual funds, shares, eurobonds, crypto)
Pension statement and TCC
Certificate of medical coverage from employer provided insurance coy
Cover letter explaining significant credits/debits in my account and pattern of account operation (conversion to/from USD, transfers out to investment account etc)
Detailed supporting evidence for significant transactions (e.g. for large purchases i added receipts, for credits related to reimbursement of work expenses i included source receipts, screenshot of approval of the expense from the expense app, remittance advice note from employer all for the same amount etc >> I told visa officer in the cover letter that i would only provide this detailed paper trail for a sample of the significant credits/debits, not all transactions, which was deemed fair enough)
Pictures of myself, my parents, my younger ones for home ties
Pictures with and details of relatives in the UK

Visa alert!

5-year tourist visa.

Biometrics date: 5th of Feb
Decision date: 18th of Feb
Collection date: 19th of Feb

Previous visas - 6 month UK visa used once.

My advice > whenever anything is not clear, over explain. Best case is to have clean account statements, but even if it's not, as long as the transactions in your account are genuine and you can clearly explain the pattern of account activity (backed up with evidence upon evidence), you will be fine.

Visa officers are reasonable people, just make clear, evidence backed claims to give them enough to work with.

Hi all!

I have a six-month visa that is expiring at the end of the month and I am planning for the renewal next year. It has been used once. In the time since my last application, I've changed employers and am earning a different salary. My current employer also reimburses expenses (lunch, dinner, transportation expense on work trips etc). The basic process is that you get a company credit card to bill work expenses to (so you dont have to be out of pocket from using personal funds), then claim your reimbursement, which upon approval is paid into your salary account, and you are responsible for applying the reimbursement to clean up the card.

So I have the debits for the allowed work expenses on one card account (with Bank A) and then reimbursement from my company into my salary account (which is with Bank B). Immediately I get the reimbursement into salary account with Bank B, I then move the money out to clear the credit card with Bank A.

It is sounding convoluted as I am typing it now self.

What would be the best way to explain these credits into my account from my employer which are not salary credits, and which basically come in and out?

Thank youuu!!

oliverjiad:
Good morning

2015 Toyota Corolla:3945 usd,#3.1m to clear
2016 Toyota corolla :4613 usd,#3.550m to clear
2017 Toyota corolla :5396 usd,#4.1m to clear
2018 Toyota corolla :6311 usd,#4.750m to clear

Camry

2015:4568 usd,#3.550m to clear
2016:5342 usd,#4.1m to clear
2017:6248 usd,#4.7m to clear
2018:7308 usd,#5.450m to clear

Jaid

Thank you!

How much will clear:

2015 Toyota Corolla
2016 Toyota corolla
2017 Toyota corolla
2018 Toyota corolla

And

2015 - 18 camry?

Can you also share the dollar ($) amount (which will remain fixed based on CIF value)

Thanks

LeoJassy:
where you able to do the biometric on that that

Yes

Visa Alert!

Application Date: April 5th
Biometrics: April 9th
Transfer to DMC: 9th
Received by DMC: 10th
TLS collection mail: 24th
Pick up: 25th

First time applicant, no travel history to western countries (only Ghana and DRC for work).

Thanks to everyone for all the information on this thread - I was able to glean so much info from here and tailor my application to suit my unique circumstances, and I am beyond grateful for everyone who has willingly given their time to contribute to this thread.

In the spirit of passing it forward, I'd like to give some details about the documents I submitted, who knows, it may be helpful to someone else.

Long post alert!

My main worry before applying was that I am young and single, so demonstrating home ties would be tough, and the complicated nature of my finances.

So I took my time and really overloaded ECO with documents to back up every claim I made

Employment evidence- employment letter, promotion letters, introduction letter (stating grade, current job role, previous job roles, emolument), screenshot of leave approval mail which coincided with the period I indicated for my trip, 6 months payslips (for both monthly salary and every allowance that entered my account from my employer), salary account statement, awards, newspaper clippings of work events with my picture representing my coy etc.

Financial evidence- account statement, mutual funds statements, stocks statement, crypto currency account statement, pension statement (each savings/investment account included both the balance as well as the transaction statement from inception to date, and inception was mostly around 2019, 2020)

Family evidence - details of sister in the uk, invitation letter and tenancy agreement from her (as I stated I would be staying with her), her marriage certificate (since we no longer have the same last name), and a couple of family pictures of us (baby pics and adult pics).

Trip: Budget was 2,100 pounds for a 2 week trip, and I included a detailed itinerary (so I actually researched all the places I want to go, distance from my sister's house, cost of trains, cost of activities etc and built it up to make up my budget)

Cover letter: I had to write a detailed cover letter to explain my account pattern because I don't leave my salary in my account, I convert to dollars and invest in different things depending on market yields.

Fun fact: My salary account opening balance was 170k, closing balance 500k. I told ECO that I don't leave my disposable income/savings in my salary account because it is a current account with 0% interest, while market yields are close to 20%. And I attached the various mutual funds and investment accounts as stated earlier to prove this.

During the 6 months statement period, my salary account balance once dropped to 13k, because I bought a new phone that month. I included the Amazon receipt showing the item I purchased, and the billing address (which is my address in Nigeria) to explain that low balance. For the month I paid rent, and there was a significant outflow, I attached my rent receipt.

Tldr: Be as honest as you can, tell the ECO the truth, and provide supporting documentation to back up every claim you make.

My documentation was probably overkill but I didn't want to leave anything to chance and have to start dealing with a refusal.

I'm glad it all worked out, once again, thank you all!

Naijagram:
Which TLS Centre did you use?

Ikeja.

giselle237:
you got it

🤞🤞

I did my biometrics on April 9th, and just got a mail from TLS to come and pick up my travel documents today.

I have not received any other mail from UKVI (apart from the notification that my application has arrived at the decision making center).

Is this an indication that the visa has been approved?

davodyguy:
You can walk in there on Friday. That's what premium users benefit. Any time

I went there on my appointment date of Tuesday as scheduled and they attended to me. Took about 15 minutes to finish the biometrics.

Cashmadam:
Most likely they will attend to you.

Otherwise, you can log in and change your appointment.

Kindest regards,

I logged in to amend and saw a pop up saying there would be no refund if I amend 😪😪.

I will go there tomorrow at the scheduled time.

🤞🤞

Good evening everyone!

So I booked my biometrics at TLS for Tuesday, paid for a premium timeslot.

However FG has declared Tuesday and Wednesday a public holiday 🥲🥲

Does TLS work on public holidays? If not, is there a way to reschedule the appointment (and will it cost me any extra 🥲)

Thanks!

easyyoke:
Let me give you a few tips to make your battery last longer.
First of, stop using all your fans. Save up and buy DC Fans. My Duravolt 16’ standing fan consumes just 15W at speed 1, 22W at Speed 2 and 26W at Speed 3.
Second, like one user already said, only use your freezer during the day when there is sun outside, at night, switch it off. Everything should be well frozen till the following morning. If you really want to run your refrigerator system 24hours, then save up to buy an LG inverter Fridge-Freezer combo. My 302L Fridge-Freezer combination consumes just 70W. Infact when I first bought it, it was consuming just 50W then it had fault and Foauni took in for repair. That was how it came back and started using 70W. Even with that, that is still very energy effecienct because inverter Fridge-freezer does not run 24hours. It rests when your fridge temperature gets to a level. I calculated mine and discovered it only runs for 14hours a day. So that brings down the wattage of the fridge-freezer to 43W. So get an inverter fridge-freezer if you must run them 24hours. Dont go above 300L though. The bigger the fridge, the more watt.
Third. Your 65 inch TCL should be used only during the day. Use your 32inch at night. Change your bulbs to AKT 5w bulbs. The highest should be 10w. This three suggestions will extend the hours you are getting from your battery. It you cant do without those appliances, then it is time to add more batteries to your battery

Thank you. This gives me a clear plan of attack.

Hi All,

Since this recent issue with GasCos and GenCos, electricity supply has been pretty terrible, I now get around 5 to 6 hours of light. Luckily for me, I have an existing solar set up and I bought lithium batteries in October last year.

My existing set up is:
8 solar panels of 300w each
2.5kva, 24v inverter (it had an inbuilt solar charge controller which went bad and I had to get an external charge controller last year)
60A MPPT solar charge controller
2 100Ah 25.6v lithium ion batteries connected in series, which, if I am not mistaken, gives me about 5.12kwh of power (give or take efficiency losses)

Now to the load I put on it:
65 inch TCL TV
100w samsung inverter fridge (though I recently changed the compressor, so who knows if it is still consuming 100w)
An old 175w scanfrost deep freezer (always on, not sure it cycles on and off like the inverter fridge)
Lights
Fans (ceiling fans - I never even knew these consumed so much energy until this Nepa issue when I found out one fan consumes 75w,that's almost as much as my fridge!)

I am getting about 10-12 hours of power of mixed use. Two ceiling fans + fridge and freezer will run down the battery from 100% to 5% in about 8 hours based on my calculation/observation. This means I can't run both overnight, and so I pick and choose to ensure the battery power lasts till morning when the sun comes back up.

I have two questions/concerns:
1. Is this level of drain fair enough or do you think there could be a problem with my set-up?
2. How do I get to 12 hours of power with my major appliances (fridge and freezer) running constantly? Do I need to start thinking of inverter freezers (I guess technology has improved in recent years). Or will I need to get an additional battery?

Many thanks in advance and apologies if I have asked any questions for which the answers seem obvious - I have not really paid detailed attention to alternative energy until this year.

sanyaolurilwan:
Hello, let me help give an answer to your question.

1: Can I get away with printing less than 6 months statement for my salary account?
Response: Ordinarily, what is common is to submit a 6-month bank statement, but I've read here about people who submitted 4-months bank statements and still got approved. Below is what is on the UKVI website:

financial documents showing that you have sufficient funds available. These must clearly show that you have access to the funds, such as:
bank statements which detail the origin of the funds held
building society books which detail the origin of the funds held
proof of earnings, such as a letter from your employer confirming employment details (start date of employment, salary, role, company contact details).
This is the link for your reference: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/visitor-visa-guide-to-supporting-documents/guide-to-supporting-documents-visiting-the-uk#demonstrating-personal-circumstances

Secondly: You can actually submit your application the same month of the graduation, just fill the form and fix your biometrics to like 3weeks before your exact travel date, then upload your bank statement a day before your biometrics. What I personally do most times is: I upload all documents needed after fixing a biometric date but I don't submit them, this is to make corrections in case of mistakes and corrections, then I submit the night before my biometrics. I hope this is understood.

I hope this can help you, if u need more help, I can drop my email and I can help you directly.
Thanks

Thank you!

I will definitely reach out.

Ithaca:
Good day everyone!

So my sister is graduating in July 2024 and wants to invite me to come over. I plan on applying for a 6 month visitor-visa to go on a 3-week trip, to attend her graduation and then spend the extra time visiting, so i'm thinking through the application process now.

Here is some background:

I work in a tier 1 bank and have been working there for about 6 years. In terms of income, i've been promoted a couple of times and now earn about 600k monthly, 500k quarterly lump sum allowance, 1m upfront and 1.3m leave allowance (which i can take at any point in time once i apply for leave during the year). I also have some reasonable funds in a dollar mutual fund and stock portfolio (circa $10k). I'm 27, female, single with no kids, and not much travel history (well, except a personal trip to Ghana in 2018 and a work trip to an African country in 2023). My sister intends to accommodate me for the trip, but i'll pay for my flight ticket, outings, shopping money etc etc. I am entitled to 25 leave days every year which covers my proposed 3 week trip, and i have my pension statement (going back 6 years) which has a balance of about N3m.

In terms of how i run my salary account, my monthly expenses are about 200k, and i pretty much take out about 400k for savings/investments every month (usd based because leaving it in naira is a losing bet), so its not a straightforward debit salary account, credit usd dom account, and sometimes my naira salary account goes down to as low as N10k. But my expenses are really that low (for context my biggest expense, which is rent, is 700k per annum (and i have receipts/rental agreements for this).

From everything i've seen so far, there seem to be two possible problems with my application:
1. Lack of home ties: No husband, kids or properties, the only thing tying me to Nigeria is my job. (Not sure what i will do about this except i can somehow procure a husband in Q1 2024 )
2. Salary account Usage: Account balance drops quite low periodically, and i cant directly tie every debit to the investments i'm doing (which range from dollar mutual funds, to US/UK stocks to crypto etc). I don't have any bulk inflows into the account though - just salary and allowances.

What do you think i can do between now and say April 2024 when i intend to turn in the application to address these flaws?

Thank you!

Good afternoon everyone!

This is a follow up on my earlier post. I was considering all the wahala with my salary account statement and the ease (or lack thereof) of explaining how I run my account, the account balances getting quite low periodically, converting my naira salary to dollars that I put in dollar mutual funds/buy U.S stocks etc, and it is looking more and more complicated to me.

Since last December when I made this post, I have been running my salary account to match the explanation I will give of my finances - salary and allowances come in, and then single debits of my net income/savings to a naira mutual fund (I figure it would be easier to explain that my monthly disposable income/savings just goes to a mutual fund account that I can print a statement for).

Now to my question, can I get away with printing less than 6 months statement for my salary account? I want to cut out all the parts before December when I started being deliberate about how my account is run. Can I get away with a 4 month statement? I want to turn in the application in March.

P.s - I am a first time applicant.

Has anybody else been experiencing slow speeds over the past 2 days?

Like less than 5mbps at times 😖😖

I can't even stream Netflix without buffering. I am on the Mobile roam plan.

sunkyperu205:
please which bank card did you use

First bank master card

Good day everyone!

So my sister is graduating in July 2024 and wants to invite me to come over. I plan on applying for a 6 month visitor-visa to go on a 3-week trip, to attend her graduation and then spend the extra time visiting, so i'm thinking through the application process now.

Here is some background:

I work in a tier 1 bank and have been working there for about 6 years. In terms of income, i've been promoted a couple of times and now earn about 600k monthly, 500k quarterly lump sum allowance, 1m upfront and 1.3m leave allowance (which i can take at any point in time once i apply for leave during the year). I also have some reasonable funds in a dollar mutual fund and stock portfolio (circa $10k). I'm 27, female, single with no kids, and not much travel history (well, except a personal trip to Ghana in 2018 and a work trip to an African country in 2023). My sister intends to accommodate me for the trip, but i'll pay for my flight ticket, outings, shopping money etc etc. I am entitled to 25 leave days every year which covers my proposed 3 week trip, and i have my pension statement (going back 6 years) which has a balance of about N3m.

In terms of how i run my salary account, my monthly expenses are about 200k, and i pretty much take out about 400k for savings/investments every month (usd based because leaving it in naira is a losing bet), so its not a straightforward debit salary account, credit usd dom account, and sometimes my naira salary account goes down to as low as N10k. But my expenses are really that low (for context my biggest expense, which is rent, is 700k per annum (and i have receipts/rental agreements for this).

From everything i've seen so far, there seem to be two possible problems with my application:
1. Lack of home ties: No husband, kids or properties, the only thing tying me to Nigeria is my job. (Not sure what i will do about this except i can somehow procure a husband in Q1 2024 )
2. Salary account Usage: Account balance drops quite low periodically, and i cant directly tie every debit to the investments i'm doing (which range from dollar mutual funds, to US/UK stocks to crypto etc). I don't have any bulk inflows into the account though - just salary and allowances.

What do you think i can do between now and say April 2024 when i intend to turn in the application to address these flaws?

Thank you!

Ithaca:
Hi everyone!

So I got a starlink kit from a family member who was japa-ing and got it transferred to me, however, I only got the option to use Starlink roam because apparently, there is no availability in my area (which is ridiculous, because I don't think up to 10 people have starlinks in my area 🤣🤣)

So I paid the monthly fee of 49k for Roam, but longer term I want to switch to the Standard residential plan because it's cheaper and faster (so a no-brainer).

My plan was to sign up for an additional Starlink, pay the deposit for the standard plan and whenever availability opened up, I'd tell them support I have an existing kit and just transfer the service to the kit, cancel roam and activate standard.

My problem now is that I am unable to pay the deposit for the Standard. I have tried every possible combination of card (debit, credit, Master card, Visa, verve) with multiple banks (First, Standard Chartered, GTB) and still no dice. Even the first bank card that is currently on file for the roam service was declined.

What could be the issue?

Thanks ☺️

I was finally able to order. But with a new accou t and my sisters NIN.

😅😅

Hi everyone!

So I got a starlink kit from a family member who was japa-ing and got it transferred to me, however, I only got the option to use Starlink roam because apparently, there is no availability in my area (which is ridiculous, because I don't think up to 10 people have starlinks in my area 🤣🤣)

So I paid the monthly fee of 49k for Roam, but longer term I want to switch to the Standard residential plan because it's cheaper and faster (so a no-brainer).

My plan was to sign up for an additional Starlink, pay the deposit for the standard plan and whenever availability opened up, I'd tell them support I have an existing kit and just transfer the service to the kit, cancel roam and activate standard.

My problem now is that I am unable to pay the deposit for the Standard. I have tried every possible combination of card (debit, credit, Master card, Visa, verve) with multiple banks (First, Standard Chartered, GTB) and still no dice. Even the first bank card that is currently on file for the roam service was declined.

What could be the issue?

Thanks ☺️