Your Visa: Change of Circumstance

You may be told by your Faculty that, before you can proceed to your next level of study, you need to repeat either:

• a whole year of study
• modules from a specific teaching block

If you are repeating a whole year of study and you have enough time on your current visa, you can usually do your repeat without needing a visa extension. If, as a result of the repeat, you need more time to complete your current course, you might be able to extend your Student Route in the UK before it expires.

If you have repeats which are only taking place in Teaching Block 1 or Teaching Block 2, please contact us for further information on your situation.

You might also be told you need to do repeats as an external student which will impact your Student Route visa (please see the link).

Depending on your situation, repeating modules or re-sitting exams may have implications for your visa. If you have questions about how your situation will affect your visa, please email VISA Advice.

If you wish to suspend your studies, you will need to contact your Faculty initially to discuss this option. If you decide to suspend, your Faculty will provide you with a suspension request form and you will need to fully complete and return it to them. They will subsequently submit the suspension request form via the online system for consideration by the necessary teams.

Once the suspension has been approved, and your student record has been updated to reflect this, the University will be required to submit a report to the Home Office to confirm your suspension, and you will need to leave the UK within 60 days of the date of the Home Office report.

If you choose to suspend your course or you are suspended for any reason, the University (VISA Compliance) has a legal obligation to make a report of this to UKVI within 10 days from the date of suspension. You should leave the UK as soon as possible or within an advised maximum 60 days from date of reporting to UKVI. VISA Compliance will proactively email further detail around this once reporting has taken place.

You cannot remain in the UK with a Student Route visa if you are not engaging in study; therefore, your current visa will fall for mandatory curtailment (shortening/cancellation) by UKVI. You should be notified of your new visa expiry date by email though your eVisa may take some time to reflect this change.

As your current visa will be curtailed due to the suspension, a new visa application would need to be made overseas in order to travel back to resume studies at the agreed later date. You will need to submit a CAS request form via the VISA Compliance webpage as you will need this new statement to make your visa application. As part of the CAS application process, you will need to provide proof you have left the UK.

It is important to consider it is unlikely you can suspend studies for either more than a few weeks or less than a year due to the structure of courses. Usually, a student must suspend for the whole year (or until the next academic period). However, this is an academic consideration and so would need to be discussed with your Faculty.

Financially, the amount of paid fees that are able to be refunded depends on when the suspension takes place. There are details around this which can be found on the UG Fees and Refunds Policy page (if you are studying at The College Swansea University, they have a separate refund policy, and you should be referring to the terms and conditions of you offer from The College).

If you wish to withdraw from your studies, you will need to contact your Faculty initially to discuss this option. If you decide to withdraw, your Faculty will provide you with a request form and you will need to fully complete and return it to them. They will subsequently submit the request form via the online system for consideration by the necessary teams. If you are withdrawn from Swansea University for any reason, you should be notified via email (personal and university address).

If you withdraw or are withdrawn from your course, the University (VISA Compliance) has a legal obligation to make a report of this to UKVI within 10 days from the date of withdrawal. You should leave the UK as soon as possible or within an advised maximum 60 days from date of reporting to UKVI. VISA Compliance will proactively email further detail around this once reporting has taken place.

Once the UKVI have been notified, they will take action to curtail (cancel) your current visa because you will no longer be carrying out the activity associated with that visa i.e. studying. UKVI will contact you by email and tell you the new expiry date so please keep a close on your personal email address including your junk and spam folders. Depending on the circumstances, the visa may be cancelled with immediate effect or with a new expiry date of 60 days. Usually, students who stop studying part way through their course would receive curtailment to 60 days. However, this is not always guaranteed. 

You cannot remain in the UK with a Student visa if you are not engaging in study; therefore, your current visa will fall for mandatory curtailment (shortening/cancellation) by UKVI. You should be notified of your new visa expiry date by email though your eVisa may take some time to reflect this change.

As the previous visa will have been curtailed due the withdrawal, a new visa application would need to be made overseas in order to travel back to the UK to pursue future study (if this is what is planned). You may need to re-apply for a course via the Admissions Department and would need a new CAS statement to apply for a new visa.

Financially, the amount of paid fees that are able to be refunded depends on when the withdrawal takes place. There are details around this which can be found on the UG Fees and Refunds Policy page (if you are studying at The College Swansea University, they have a separate refund policy, and you should be referring to the terms and conditions of you offer from The College).

If you wish to transfer courses without applying for a new visa, the decision will need to go before the VISA Compliance team after a formal request to transfer has been made via your Faculty.

You will need to speak to your Faculty initially to ensure you meet the academic requirements for the new course. If you subsequently meet the academic requirements, the Faculty will provide you with a ‘Previous Study Questionnaire’ (PSQ) that will need to be fully completed and returned before your transfer request can be submitted through the online system for consideration by the necessary teams.

The UKVI rules around transferring to a new course having not completed the one for which the Student Route visa was granted, are as follows:

Changing courses and continuing on your current visa may be permitted if the following apply:

• It is a full-time degree level course
• Is not at a lower level than the current course
• You can complete the new course within the time you already have on your Student visa
• The new course is related to the previous one and the new course supports your genuine course ambitions and aspirations

You cannot usually transfer between Faculties.

You will need to justify on your course transfer request form how the change relates to your old course and how it will support your genuine career aspirations. It is recommended that you write as much detail as you can on your transfer form and follow the course transfer request process as instructed by the Faculty. Even if there is no legal reason to prevent the transfer, it is an academic decision and will need to be discussed with the Faculty. If your Faculty agree the transfer from an academic perspective, the transfer request would still need to be approved by VISA Compliance who will assess the transfer against the UKVI criteria.

It is highly unlikely that you will be able to transfer to a non-related programme using your current Student visa as we do not permit these transfer requests.

If you wish to transfer to a non-related programme, you might need to withdraw from your studies and re-apply through the Admissions team. If you wish to pursue this study option, please speak to your Faculty initially to ensure this is viable.

If your new course requires an ATAS certificate, you will not be able to transfer course until you have applied for and received a new ATAS certificate. The VISA Compliance team will hold your transfer request until they have seen your new ATAS certificate. If you decide not to transfer programme, please can you contact your Faculty to ask for the online transfer request to be removed.

If you have repeated modules on your original course and are unable to complete your transfer course within the validity of your current visa, you will need to apply for a new visa from overseas, before you will be permitted to transfer courses. If you have submitted a transfer request for consideration, the VISA Compliance team will hold your transfer request until they have seen your new visa.

Please note that the Faculty will have a latest date by which the course transfer must take place, so please make sure you plan; you don’t want to end up in a situation where you have not been attending either course as this will have implications for your visa status as well.

If you complete a course earlier than expected (ie. the date on your CAS statement), then this early completion will be reported to UKVI by VISA Compliance and the “extra time” on your visa will be removed via curtailment. Your visa will be curtailed/shortened by UKVI who will provide you with a new expiry date – usually via email. You will usually be given 4 months wrap-up time calculated from the new course completion date. Your eVisa may take some time to reflect this change.

You cannot hold a Student Route visa if you are not engaging in study – there is no way to “keep” the extra time on the visa if it is not required for study, even if this is a preference. Unfortunately, there is no refund for time paid for but not used on the visa.

You might complete your course early because, for example, you do not secure a work placement for a Year in Industry so study your final year in your 3^rd year etc.

Completing your course early does not affect your eligibility for the Graduate Route, however you must still meet all the other requirements for the application.

Please note that if you leave the UK after receiving notification from VISA Compliance that they have reported your early completion to the UKVI, you may face difficulty re-entering using your Student visa as it is in the process of being curtailed. It is advised that if you want to apply for Graduate Route (or any further immigration permission), you apply for this visa and only travel outside the UK once it has been fully granted. 

Please contact VISA Advice for more information if you are in this situation, quoting your student number.  

Adding a year in industry to an existing course is a common transfer request when the Year in Industry option is available. However, if approved, you will need to extend your visa to accommodate the extra year you require to complete your course – you may be able to make this visa extension in the UK (to be confirmed by VISA Compliance).

Firstly, you will need to apply to transfer to the Year in Industry option of your course via your Faculty so your academic record can be updated (please see the section “Course Transfers”). Check with your Faculty whether there is a deadline by which you need to apply to transfer. Once the transfer is updated on your student record, the University will update the UKVI to let them know that you have added a work placement to your course.

About 6 months before your current visa expires (check your visa decision letter/eVisa to ensure you know when this date is) submit a CAS request form via the VISA Compliance webpage as you will need this to make your visa extension for the additional year. You must pay the visa fee and Immigration Health Surcharge again to cover this extension. You should be looking to extend your visa once the placement is coming to an end but before your current visa expires so you can start your 4^th year (final year) – if you are unsuccessful in securing a placement, you will just do the 3^rd year as planned and your visa will be correct (check with your Faculty as to what will happen if you don’t secure a placement).

The VISA Advice Team’s webpage: Extending your Student route visa in the UK - Swansea University gives you a detailed overview of the visa requirements and the process and timings etc. It is also where information is updated when the UKVI change any rules, so this is where you’ll find the most up to date information when the time comes for you to make your application. If you apply for your visa outside the UK, you still need a new CAS but you need to follow slightly different instructions to prepare and make a Student visa application overseas.

For those who decide to add a supervised, integral, and assessed placement to their course of study in the UK, please see the Student Route Visa Placement Policy for more information on engagement expectations and course transfers.

If you are hoping to transfer to a different university in the UK, you would need to discuss this with the new university’s Admissions Team and Student Visa Team (or equivalent) in the first instance.

You would need to withdraw from Swansea University (please see the section “Withdrawing”) and, in most cases, leave the UK and apply for a new Student Route visa from outside the UK to continue studies at the new university.

The new university’s Admissions or Visa Team would be able to provide further information about your visa based on a full understanding of your situation (as there are some very specific exceptions where Student visa holders can transfer universities without needing a new visa). 

For more information on this specific type of course transfer, please see the information at the VISA Compliance Change of Circumstances webpage (linked): 

For more information about updating the University with any personal changes of circumstances or changes to your personal information, please see the VISA Compliance Change of Circumstances webpage (linked). 

Please note that if you are living in the UK on a Dependant Visa and your relationship to the "Main Visa" holder breaks down ie. you divorce your spouse, you must inform the UKVI as this may affect your visa. You may lose your Dependant visa status and may need to leave the UK or apply for your own visa. Please email us for more information if this scenario affects you.