How UKVI Tests a Marriage: The Family Route Checks on Income, Evidence and the Genuine Relationship

Three tests, in order

Parts 2 and 3 described validity, routing and the automated checks that run on every application. A spouse file then meets three tests specific to Appendix FM. The financial requirement is tested against Appendix FM SE, a list of specified documents that leaves almost no room for substitutes. The relationship is tested against the “Relationship with a partner” caseworker guidance, version 7.0 of October 2024, which grades evidence. And the whole file is read for the triggers that send a case to a marriage investigation under the sham marriage guidance. As Part 6 explained, the burden on income and relationship is yours; the burden of proving a sham is the Home Office’s.

Test one: the income, proved the specified way

The minimum income requirement rose from GBP 18,600 to GBP 29,000 on 11 April 2024. The Migration Advisory Committee’s 2025 review suggested a lower figure of around GBP 23,000 to GBP 25,000; as of November 2026 the government has not adopted it and GBP 29,000 remains the figure for new applications. Since April 2024 no extra amount is added for children. The savings alternative is GBP 88,500 held for six months, with a declaration of where it came from.

What decides most Pakistani spouse cases is not the figure but the proof. For a sponsor in salaried employment with the same employer for six months, Appendix FM SE requires three things covering the same six months before the date of application: payslips, personal bank statements showing that salary going into an account in the sponsor’s name (or joint names), and an employer letter confirming the employment, the gross annual salary, the length of employment, the period over which that salary has been paid and whether the job is permanent, fixed term or through a staffing firm. A P60 and a contract are optional extras. Self employment, directors’ income, pensions and non employment income each have their own list.

When a document is missing

Appendix FM SE has its own flexibility rule, paragraph D. Where a specified document is missing, or in the wrong format, the decision maker “may” request it within a stated timescale, but will not do so where the application fails for other reasons. Where the missing information can be verified from another document, the issuer’s website or a regulator’s website, the application “may be granted exceptionally”. Where there is a valid reason the document cannot be supplied, the requirement may be waived or alternative evidence requested. Note the word “may” throughout: it is discretion, not a right, and a file that relies on it is a file in the complex queue.

Test two: “genuine and subsisting”

The guidance tells caseworkers there is no specified evidence for the relationship, so an application cannot be turned down “for lack of a particular document”. Instead it asks for a picture built from several sources, and it is honest about what it finds persuasive. Strong evidence is “issued by an organisation and/or service provider that carries out checks on the person involved”: a tenancy, a mortgage, a utility account, an insurance policy, a bank. Documents “do not need to be in both names if they cover the same time period and the same address”.

The guidance also says what it finds weak. Applicants are “not encouraged” to send photographs or printouts of WhatsApp, email or social media “as these can be falsified”; such material “is not without weight”, but it will not carry a case on its own. This is the single biggest gap we see in files prepared at home in Pakistan: hundreds of chat screenshots, no money transfer receipts, no travel tickets, no joint account.

The evidence scale: strong, acceptable, weak

• Strong: tenancy or mortgage agreements, utility bills and official documents linking both to one address; joint bank accounts; money transfers between the couple while apart; insurance, car finance or joint purchases.
• Acceptable: travel tickets and holiday bookings for visits; individual bank statements showing shared spending; electoral roll confirmation.
• Weak: photographs; certified transcripts of calls and messages; social media.

Couples who live apart

Most Pakistani spouse applicants have never lived with the sponsor, so the guidance’s separate rule applies: where a couple live apart there must be a reasonable explanation, the separation must be temporary, and the officer should expect “additional evidence of commitment such as shared financial responsibility or visits”. In practice that means the sponsor’s visits to Pakistan (tickets, entry stamps, photographs at the nikah), regular remittances in the sponsor’s name to the applicant, and evidence that the two families know each other. Where direct checks show non cohabitation, an unclear response or “significant periods apart”, the guidance says the officer should not automatically turn the case down but should ask for evidence. Answer that request fully; it is the last stop before an interview.

Test three: the marriage investigation triggers

An interview “may be considered” where documentary or explanatory evidence is insufficient, after discussion with a senior caseworker. Where there is reason to believe a marriage is a sham, the case moves under the Marriage and civil partnership referral and investigation scheme and the sham marriage suitability guidance, where the Home Office carries the burden. The published indicators are not in the partner guidance; the sham marriage guidance of October 2025 and the marriage investigations guidance set them out, and the usual signs are the ones you would expect: no shared language, no knowledge of each other’s lives, a large age gap with no explanation, a payment, a previous sham, a sponsor who has sponsored before. Where evidence is found to be false the decision is made on suitability grounds, and Part 4’s ten year bar is in play.

What stays on the record

Everything. A spouse application sits on both person records, yours and the sponsor’s (Part 1). The sponsor’s history of earlier applications supported, the income figures declared, the addresses used and the outcome of any interview are all visible to the next officer. A sponsor who has supported a previous partner, or whose income was found short last time, should expect that history to be read before the new file is opened. That is not a reason to hide it; it is a reason to explain it in the covering letter.

How to prepare

1. Build the income file to the list, document by document, for exactly the six months before the application date, and reconcile every payslip to a bank credit.
2. Ask the sponsor to check their own HMRC record (the personal tax account) before you declare a figure.
3. Start the relationship file from the strong row: remittances in the sponsor’s name, the sponsor’s travel to Pakistan, a joint account or policy if you can open one, the nikah nama and registration.
4. Explain the separation in one honest paragraph: why you live apart, how often you meet, how you support each other, and when that will end.
5. Declare the past. Earlier marriages, earlier applications, earlier sponsorships. All of them are already on the record.

Part 11 explains what happens when you withdraw or change an application, and why a withdrawn spouse application is not the clean slate many families expect.

Questions applicants ask

About the author

Mujtaba Maharvi

Mujtaba is the CEO of Westside Visa Consultants. He began his career in 2001 as Executive Secretary to the Consul General of the Republic of Korea in Karachi, co founded Westside in London in 2003, and has since guided more than 1,000 students and families through UK, European, North American and Australian visa decisions from the firm’s offices in DHA Lahore and the UK. He holds postgraduate degrees from the University of Karachi, the University of Padua, Loughborough University and the University of West London, and writes this series from more than twenty years of reading decision letters.

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