Indeed, the UK 2, 5 or 10-year standard visa is commonly known as long term visit visa. Since, in terms of Appendix V of the Immigration Rules, a visitor is a person who is coming to the UK for a temporary purpose. Therefore, a holder of a long term visit visa can only stay in the UK for up to 180 days per visit. Moreover, it is normally not expedient to directly apply for a UK long term 2, 5, 10 years visit visa. Therefore, for a successful application, it is a prerequisite to have a 6 months visa in the recent past. Perhaps, only if an applicant is able to state a clear purpose of frequently visiting the UK.

A Credible Ongoing Reason

In fact, for getting a long term visitor visa an applicant needs to demonstrate that he/she has a Credible Ongoing Reason of visiting the UK as:

meeting a family member – for instance a brother, sister etc.

meeting a business connection such a export/import partner, supplier etc.

tourism or sightseeing if the applicant is an inveterate traveller

However, there should be no reason(s) to doubt that the applicant intends to make UK his/her home. For instance, following are not credible ongoing reasons to visit the UK:

marriage or civil partnership

unaccompanied children

medical treatment

PLAB Test

What an applicant needs to demonstrate?

Indeed, a long term visitor visa applicant needs to demonstrate the he/she has:

stable financial and personal circumstances

strong ties to the home country

adequate overall circumstances, which will not change significantly in the foreseeable future

Avoid long stays

A holder of a long term visit visa can stay in the UK for up to 180 days per visit. However, this does not mean that a visitor may stay for up to 180 days. Perhaps, most of the visitors don’t stay for more than 10-15 days per visit. In fact, a long stay on a multiple entry visa may lead to doubt the intentions of a visitor. Therefore, if a person is planning to get a long term visitor visa UK for up to 10 years then it is advisable to keep the duration of stay short. And the number of trips to a bare minimum.