okay: you are both in the states. You get married. To get the spouse visa, an application needs to be made to her local British visa-granting consulate; you must fill out an online form and then submit paperwork to the consulate. So you can either make an appointment to go there in person and get the visa the same day, or apply by mail, which may take a week or two. You have to submit her passport, a copy of yours, proof of the relationship (pictures, emails, etc) and your marriage certificate. And, of course, the payment. Once she gets her passport back with the visa in it, she can come to the UK.

Now, not all British consulates are visa-granting; check online to find the visa-granting one for her area.

Overstaying in the UK won't matter when she goes home. But, to be honest, it may reflect badly on her when she applies for the spouse visa - I don't have experience with that personally, but from what I understand from other people's posts, they can be quite nasty about it.

ps YES you need to be married before applying.

I suggest you go to www.ukvisas.gov.uk - they have all the guidance noes and application forms there.

 

I'm referring to this thread:
http://www.easyexpat.com/forums/ftopic_11752.htm

So yes, it can be refused. Was there a good reason she overstayed?

You can generally count on the Home Office/Immigration authorities being very unsympathetic and in fact rather harsh; it's best to make sure you do everything you can 'their way', though even that won't guarantee you won't have problems.

I was almost refused entry into the UK last year even though I'd never overstayed my visa (the man led me into a little room and accused me of trying to abuse the visa system and suggested I was trying to work in Britain illegally ).

 

Well, I don't think that there's any way around it, you will have to tell them she overstayed her visa. They can check up on it, so it's best to be honest. Cash-in-hand work is not really legal, and certainly not on an expired visa, so I wouldn't suggest being open about her doing it.

I suppose in the worst case scenario, since you haven't done anything illegal, you may still be able to live in the US with her if her UK visa gets rejected.

I have an American passport. I just finished a six-month work in Britain program, then went to Paris overnight to come back in on a new stamp for another few months to be with my fella (living off of savings). I barely got in, and just got a lot of threats and accustations from the passport guy who thought he was, like, Colombo.

I got a fiancee visa in the end.

 

The UK home office will take your moneyt ( a lot of it) and the mess you about. As is their right if you apply as a UK resident to bring in a spouse. An overstayer is just gonna be obvious groudns for them to nix her.

There is a workaround if you are hell bent on living in the UK with your new wife. It can take from two years or more, but it is an ironclad route.

You'd be better off getting married, then you (The UK national) go and get a job elswhere in the EU. Register as a resodent there. You then applyfor an EEA family permit for the American wife to live with you there. By doing so, you have formally excercised your EU freedom on movement rights for yourself and family ie her.

You can then either live in that EU country for however long it takes for her to get an EU passport (probably at least 5 yrs maybe as long as 7 or 9 depending) ..... OR having lived in that EU country for more than two years, you then tell the britsh authorities that you wish to excercise your EU treaty rights to freedom of movement again - this time from the country you have been a legal resident in - with your wife. They must grant you this for free and as of right. Whether she has entered the UK wrongly before is not relevant grounds for denial. As long as you are excersing your freedom of movement rights.

By doing this you are excercising a right (freedom of movement), which sueprcedes the UK's home office's legal reach. They must grant you a residence permit for her. This right is established under a legal precendent called "The Surinder Singh Principle".

So if you at all can get a job eslewhere in the EU, I suggest you dont apply for UK residence permit for her at all. Just go and establish yourself elsewhere and you've got all this sorted out.