Immigrant visa fee increases for UK

The basic cost of an immigrant visa for settlement inside the UK will rise in April from the current cost of £585 to £644.

However, the rate rise also comes with a new premium visa renewal service which will be made available to the more wealthy to allow them to avoid much of the embarrassment and trauma associated with going through the process. This means that highly skilled migrants, which by definition extends from international bankers to overpaid footballers that wish to wish to extend their UK residence will soon be able to use the special service for a small charge of around £15,000 each time.

Elsewhere, fees for UK-based migrants who are submitting applications for being allowed to bring aging parents to Britain to live in their care will jump by over 100 percent to over £1900 while extra children will be subjected to an additional ten percent fee per child.

Phil Woolas, the Immigration Minister, said that the new fees would help offset the operating costs of Britain’s points-based system along with charges associated with the roll-out of the new foreign national ID cards. Woolas further suggested that those who most benefit from the visa system should be helping the financial running of the program which gives them most benefit.

The new £15,000 "premium service" is designed to essentially allow those who can afford it bypass the red-tape associaed with applications and renewals.