Q: I have been living in the UK for nearly 10 years and currently hold a Skilled Worker visa granted for just over a year, expiring around April next year. I have been planning to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) under the 10-year Long Residence route. However, back in October 2023 when my visa expired, I briefly travelled to a neighbouring country, re-entered the UK as a visitor for three months, and then returned to my home country. The following year, on 2 March, I re-entered the UK on a Youth Mobility Scheme (YMS) visa. I have since switched to a Skilled Worker visa in-country. Under these circumstances, would I still be eligible to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain under the 10-year Long Residence route?
Answer:
Having examined the details of your case, your immigration history presents an intricate set of overlapping legal factors.
The single most significant change to the 10-year Long Residence rules over the past decade occurred on 11 April 2024.
Eligibility for 10-year ILR must therefore be assessed against the contrasting requirements in force both before and after this legislative change.
The critical issue in your circumstances is the roughly three-month period spent in the UK under visitor status.
Under both the legacy provisions and the revised rules, time spent residing in the UK as a visitor is treated as a fatal break in the continuity of your UK residence.
Having reviewed your circumstances, assessed the Immigration Rules and caseworker guidance, cross-referenced artificial intelligence analyses, and compared your situation against relevant precedent casework, I set out below the legal analysis and recommended strategic direction.
Statutory Grounds Establishing the Break in Continuous Residence
Under the provisions of Appendix Continuous Residence, Appendix Long Residence, and the Home Office’s official Long Residence Caseworker Guidance, this issue turns on three primary legal points:
- The Pre-11 April 2024 Rules (in force when the visitor entry occurred: Paragraph 276A(a)(v))Under Paragraph 276A of the Immigration Rules in force in October 2023, where an applicant departed the UK with valid leave and subsequently re-entered, continuous residence was preserved only if they re-entered having been granted valid leave to enter on the same route or another route leading to settlement.A grant of leave to enter as a visitor, however, is an explicitly temporary visitor category that does not count towards settlement and is treated as breaking the chain of continuous residence; it cannot bridge the preceding period of long residence with any subsequent grant of leave.
- Transitional Provisions under Appendix Long ResidenceUnder current provisions in Appendix Long Residence (read alongside CR 4.1 and LR 11.3), any qualifying period relied upon for the 10-year continuous residence requirement must consist of lawful permission.Home Office caseworker guidance expressly provides that time spent with permission as a Visitor, Short-term Student, or Seasonal Worker cannot be aggregated towards 10-year continuous residence and operates to break the chain of continuous residence. Your three-month stay under visitor status squarely triggers this exclusion.
- Discontinuity Between the Date of Departure and the Status Held on Re-entryAlthough your Graduate visa was valid when you departed on 7 October 2023, the endorsement granted upon your re-entry on 9 October was leave to enter as a Visitor.Caseworkers reviewing this timeline will treat your lawful continuous residence for settlement purposes as having been extinguished upon the expiry of your Graduate visa on 8 October 2023, because your subsequent physical presence in the UK until January 2024 was merely as a visitor, which cannot be cured by the subsequent grant of YMS entry clearance in February 2024.
Why Deferring the Application to Early 2027 (to Offset the 4-Month Gap) Is Legally Unviable
Under the 10-year Long Residence rules, a gap overseas of fewer than 180 days constitutes an allowable absence only where the applicant held substantive, qualifying leave both immediately prior to departure and upon re-entry.In your case, you did not merely remain abroad; you returned to and physically resided in the UK under Visitor status.Consequently, Home Office casework databases (CID/Atlas) formally record your presence between 9 October 2023 and January 2024 as that of a “Visitor”. As soon as a caseworker opens your immigration history, your preceding seven years of continuous residence will be treated as broken as of 8 October 2023, making an outright refusal virtually inevitable.
The Immediate Danger: The 1-Year Skilled Worker Visa Expiring in April Next
YearThe most urgent complication is that your sponsor, acting on the assumption that you would qualify for 10-year ILR shortly, assigned a Certificate of Sponsorship (CoS) for only one year (or 16 months), causing your leave to expire in April next year (2027).If you submit a 10-year Long Residence ILR application in early 2027 and receive a refusal, the timing could coincide with the expiry of your current permission, placing you at immediate risk of becoming an overstayer.Furthermore, because any new continuous residence clock began running only from your re-entry on the YMS route in February 2024, an application under the 10-year Long Residence route (SET LR) would not mature until January or February 2034 at the earliest. Relying on this is unrealistic, particularly given the Government’s stated policy intention to reform or phase out the standalone 10-year Long Residence route.
Actionable Solutions to Implement Immediately
Stage 1: Secure an Extension of Your Skilled Worker Sponsorship (3- or 4-Year CoS)
Because the 10-year Long Residence route has been severed, your settlement strategy must shift entirely to the 5-year Skilled Worker settlement route (SET O).
You will become eligible for Indefinite Leave to Remain once you accrue five continuous years starting from the date you switched into the Skilled Worker route from your YMS visa.
You must explain the position candidly to your employer’s HR or authorising personnel—clarifying that the historical visitor endorsement broke the 10-year route—and formally request that they assign an extension CoS for a minimum of three years roughly three months prior to your visa expiry in April 2027 (around January 2027).
Stage 2: Restructure Your Settlement Timeline
Your earliest, most legally sound path to settlement is to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain up to 28 days before completing a full five continuous years on the Skilled Worker route, calculated from the initial grant date of your Skilled Worker permission.
Conclusion
While it would be preferable to deliver welcome news, immigration law operates under rigid statutory boundaries, and identifying the reality early enables you to regularise your position safely.
Because the 6-month visitor leave to enter stamp granted immediately following the expiry of your Graduate visa effectively reset the continuous residence clock accumulated since 2016, your primary priority must be securing an extension of your Skilled Worker visa to reach the five-year milestone.
If you nevertheless wish to test the 10-year route, you must do so fully prepared for an adverse decision, applying no earlier than 28 days prior to the 10-year anniversary of your initial entry.
John Suh
UK Regulated Immigration Legal Adviser
25+ Years of Experience in UK Visa & Immigration Services
OISC / IAA Registration Number: F200500022
Director, ilong Global Ltd & UK Immigration Centre Ltd
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Original Enquiry:
Hello,
Could you please advise whether I am eligible to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) under the 10-year Long Residence route?
I have resided in the UK since 2016 and was preparing to submit my 10-year Long Residence application in 2027. However, I require expert confirmation as to whether a brief departure and subsequent re-entry as a Visitor around the expiry of my Graduate visa in 2023 broke my continuous residence accrued prior to that date.
At the time, my Graduate visa was valid until 8 October 2023, and I had job interviews scheduled in the UK immediately after that date. On 7 October 2023, whilst my Graduate visa was still valid, I departed the UK for a brief stay in the Netherlands, and re-entered the UK on 9 October 2023 to attend my scheduled interviews.
At UK Immigration Control in Rotterdam, I explained fully to the Immigration Officer that my Graduate visa had expired the day before and that I was returning to the UK to attend scheduled employment interviews, presenting supporting evidence including interview invitation emails. Following examination, the Immigration Officer endorsed my passport with a 6-month Leave to Enter stamp stating: “Leave to enter until: Six months – No work or recourse to public funds”, permitting my entry.
After completing my interviews in the UK, I departed for South Korea in January 2024. Once the Youth Mobility Scheme opened to South Korean nationals in February 2024, I formally applied for and was granted a YMS visa, re-entering the UK in February 2024. Since then, I have maintained valid permission and resided in the UK lawfully.
I wish to ascertain whether re-entering on 9 October 2023 under Visitor Leave to Enter definitively severed my continuous residence built up since 2016.
My research indicates that under the transitional provisions of Appendix Continuous Residence for Long Residence applicants, there is provision regarding applicants who held permission upon departure, did not exceed the absence limit, and “returned to the UK with a valid permission (on the same or another route)”. Given this, I believe the interaction between Paragraph 276A (in force in 2023) and the current transitional provisions requires professional legal analysis.
My current permission is a 1-year Skilled Worker visa expiring in April next year. Because I believed I would reach the 10-year mark next year and qualify for ILR, my employer assigned a CoS for only one year. My initial date of entry was September 2016, and because there was a 4-month gap between my Graduate visa and my Youth Mobility visa, my intention had been to make up those four months and lodge my ILR application in early 2027.
I would be most grateful for your professional advice.