First Tier Tribunal and Upper Tier Tribunal for Immigration

If you have recently received a refusal of your immigration or asylum application from the Home Office, you may be able to appeal to the First-Tier tribunal if you have a legal right to appeal. The First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) is responsible for handling appeals relating to permission to stay in the UK, deportation from the UK and entry clearance decisions. If your appeal to the First-Tier Tribunal is not successful, you may then be able to ask the Upper-Tier Tribunal to review the decision made if you believe they made a legal mistake when deciding on your appeal.

First Tier Tribunal Immigration appeal process

To appeal a Home Office decision to the First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber), you must have the legal right of appeal. Not all decisions made by the Home Office come with a legal right of appeal. To check if you can appeal, review your Home Office decision letter first.

If you do not have a legal right to appeal, you may be able to ask for an Administrative Review instead. An Administrative Review is different from an appeal as it is a request for the Home Office to check if the correct decision-making criteria were applied when they made their decision.

If you have the legal right to appeal to the First-Tier Tribunal, you can submit the appeal yourself or engage the services of an immigration solicitor who can appeal on your behalf. Where possible, it is always advisable to use the services of a legal professional because they understand the grounds for refusal and how to overcome them. Simply appealing is not sufficient. You must have a robust appeal case to ensure that your appeal application is not dismissed and to set out the legal basis for why your legal decision should be changed in your favour.

It is important to act quickly as soon as you have received your decision letter from the Home Office. If you are inside the UK, you will have 14 days to lodge your appeal from the date on the written reasons for the decisions. If you are outside of the UK, you will have 28 days to appeal.

What happens after the first-tier tribunal is allowed?

Once your appeal application has been submitted, you may be invited to attend a hearing, depending on the tribunal’s decision. If there is no hearing, a judge will make the decision based on the documents you submitted for the appeal.

Even if your appeal is allowed, this does not mean you will be able to enter or stay in the UK. It simply means that the Home Office will be required to reconsider your immigration application. In addition, even if the First Tier Tribunal decides in your favour, the Home Office may still appeal the tribunal’s decision.

If you win your appeal and the Home Office reverses the decision made, you will be issued with your visa or other immigration permission.

If your appeal is not successful, you may still have a range of options available, including:

• Appealing to the Upper-Tier Tribunal
• Requesting a Judicial Review whereby the Administrative Court will determine whether the decision made by the Home Office was lawful, or
• Submitting a fresh immigration application

Upper Tier Tribunal Immigration appeal

If you lose your first immigration appeal (or if you are given immigration on limited grounds) and there is evidence that the First-Tier Tribunal made a legal mistake when reaching their decision, you can ask for permission to appeal to the Upper-Tier Tribunal. You will not have the automatic right to appeal; you must request permission.

When submitting an application to appeal to the Upper-Tier Tribunal, you must make a case for why the decision was legally wrong. Some examples of legal mistakes include where the:

• Judge got the law wrong
• Judge did not apply the correct law
• Judge did not follow the correct procedures, which affected the decision, or
• Judge had no evidence to support the decision

Again, you must meet the deadline for submitting your appeal to the Upper-Tier Tribunal. To make an immigration appeal to the Upper-Tier Tribunal, you must seek permission to appeal from the First-Tier Tribunal within 14 days of the decision if you are within the UK or 28 days if you are outside the UK.

To apply to the Upper-Tier Tribunal, you will need to complete and submit the Upper Tribunal permission request form ¹. This must then be sent to the correct address along with any required documents, which may include:

• The decision made by the First-tier Tribunal
• The First-tier Tribunal ‘notice of refusal of permission to appeal’
• The First-tier Tribunal ‘refusal to admit the application for permission’
• A written statement setting out your reasons why you think the First-tier Tribunal made an error when reaching their decision, and
• Any other relevant documents that you provided to the First-tier Tribunal

What happens after the upper-tier tribunal is allowed?

If the Upper-Tier tribunal grants you permission to appeal, your immigration case may be taken to a hearing or a decision can be made based on your application. When you apply, you can state whether you want a hearing or not. If you have a hearing to decide your appeal, you or your legal representative will be advised when and where the hearing is to take place.

You will usually receive a decision from the Upper-Tier Tribunal within 28 days.

If the Upper-Tier Tribunal refuses your appeal or the judge agrees with the First-Tier judge, you may be able to appeal to the Court of Appeal if you believe that a legal mistake was made. If applying to appeal, you must do this within 28 days if you are in England or Wales. If you are considering appealing to the Court of Appeal, please speak to a member of our immigration law team who can review your case and recommend the best course of action. In some cases, it may be better to submit a fresh application or consider a Judicial review. If your solicitor agrees that an appeal to a higher court is the best course of action, they will prepare your case and handle the appeals process on your behalf.

Reference:

¹ GOV.UK: Application for permission to appeal against a decision made by the First‑tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber)