I was thinking about pitting the tinpot dictator immigration officer I had to deal with last night…but I thought I should determine if she was mearly hopelessly rude and condecending or actually incompetent (plus I could really use the information :>)
I’m in the UK on a visitors visa…6 months, no working…actually I have a ticket to go back in August. I already went though the whole interrogation on the subject when I came in. (proving I’d be going back, and that I had means to support myself in the meantime).
Then we went for a visit in Germany, overnight. With the understanding that I had been granted 6 months residency in the UK and therefore, like any other resident, could move about the EU with relative unpunity.
I was told once I left for anywhere the orginal visa was null and void (and she was not inclided to let me back in).
When she got back from talking to her boss she was even ruder…and let me in. Which makes me think she was talking out her ass. But I’ll grant she may have been competent and simply naturally unpleasent, maybe we were wrong.
There is not absolute freedom of movement for non-EEA citizens within the European Union. There is freedom of movement (more or less) within the Schengen region of the EU, but the UK is not part of that region.
Your visitor’s visa is just that. It does not make you a “resident” for the period of its duration.
Is it actually a “visa” (i.e. you had to apply for it before you even left for the UK) or simply a stamp in your passport granting leave to enter? If the latter, you probably should be able to come and go - but it’s at the immigration officer’s discretion. My guess is that this officer suspected you of working illegally (or seeking to do so) because of the length of time you intend to stay. You’re probably lucky she wasn’t the officer you encountered on your initial arrival; from the sounds of things, she mightn’t have let you into the country in the first place.
