# So confused: EEA2 and EEA4



## mast4as (Mar 17, 2013)

Hi everyone and thank you for taking the time to read my message.

I have been looking for a long time on the web and can't seem to find a clear answer to this question, which however seems quite basic.

I am EEA national (France). I lived and worked in the UK for 4 years. My wife is non EEA and we have been married for 1 year. She got a EEA2 visa last year and this visa now expires in a couple of months.

Originally we thought we needed to apply to EEA4 but we realised that you can only apply for an EEA4 if I have been continuously exercising treaty rights in the UK for at least 5 years. Thus, since it's not the case I assume we can't apply for this visa.

So my question is: we thought the EEA2 visa was only valid for 6 months. We can't apply for an EEA4 before at least one more year. So we have strictly no idea what we are supposed to do now? She and I need to travel to Europe for our work and visit family members. If her EEA2 is expired, will immigration officers make her re-entry in the UK difficult (requiring to see our marriage certificate all the time, etc.) or will the EEA2 still be valid for an extended period of time? She needs to work. Again if her EEA2 is expired, can she still provide enough evidence to any potential employers of her rights to work in the UK?

If anyone could shed some light on this it would be fantastic, as I am getting really lost and confused.

Thanks a lot, Marc

EDIT: I just found this post on the forum: 146666-what-next-eea-family-permit-follow-up-procedure.html

But what I still don't understand is if we need to re-apply for an EEA2 from within the UK which is then valid for 5 years. So to be clear, my wife applied from outside the UK to an EEA2 family permit, which she got but is only valid for 6 months. Then from within the UK, she needs to re-apply again (?) to an EEA2 which will be then valid for 5 years. Is that correct? Does anybody know?


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## mast4as (Mar 17, 2013)

I will reply to myself, hoping this will help other people. Actually, after checking I got things mixed up. The visa that my wife had is a EEA family permit, which you get when you apply from outside the UK. It is not a EEA2 visa. Then when you are in the UK you apply for an EEA2 which is valid for 5 years. And after that, you can apply for an EEA4. Pity this process is not more clearly explained... 

Thanks a lot everyone -


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## umar00 (Apr 23, 2013)

mm thanks that's make sense..


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