Tourist Visas
If you want to come to the UK as a tourist or to visit friends you should apply as a general visitor. A visitor is someone who generally intends to be in the UK for a short period, for example, to visit friends and family, to do business, to do a short course of study, to have private medical treatment.
If you are employed abroad but want to visit the UK for short periods to undertake business related activities you may be eligible to do so as a business visitor. Other categories include student visitors, entertainers, sports visitors, people seeking medical treatmentand other special visitors.
Visitors can stay in the UK for a maximum of six months at any one time. A general visit, business, entertainer or sports visit visa may be valid for 1, 2, 5 or 10 years.
Ancestry Visas
The Ancestry visa allows a Commonwealth citizen, aged 17 or over, to immigrate to the UK with the freedom to live and work in Britain on the basis of their ancestral ties to the United Kingdom. They must have a grandparent who was born in the United Kingdom, Channel Islands, or the Isle of Man.
Applicants coming to live and work in the UK under this route must intend to seek and undertake employment and must be able to support and accommodate themselves without recourse to public funds.
This immigration route is intended as a route to settlement. The ancestral visa is granted for five years after which applicants may apply for permanent resident status. Beyond this, subject to meeting the appropriate requirements, an applicant may be able to apply to become a UK citizen through British naturalization.
Dependants of applicants will be eligible to apply for an Ancestry Dependency visa.
EEA Visas
Nationals of the European Economic Area (EEA), Swiss nationals and their families have the right to come to the UK to visit, live or work. If you have a right to live the in the UK, your family may join you here.
Other relatives do not have an automatic right to live in the UK but need to demonstrate that they are dependent on you.
If your family members are not EEA or Swiss nationals and they are coming to live with you permanently or on a long-term basis, they will need to apply for an EEA family permit before coming to the UK. The EEA family permit is similar to a visa.
If you are a national of Bulgaria or Romania, you may not work until you have been given permission.
After you have lived in the UK for a continuous period of five years, you can apply for confirmation of permanent residence.