Extending your UK spouse visa? Which certified translations you can reuse for FLR(M), the stricter in-country standard, and what needs translating fresh.
A spouse visa extension comes round about two and a half years after your first visa, and most couples assume it means repeating the whole translation job from scratch. Usually it doesn't. The marriage certificate translation you paid for last time can often go straight back into the file, and most of the new evidence UKVI wants is British and already in English. There is one catch most people don't know about: the extension is made from inside the UK, and in-country applications have a stricter rule about what a certified translation must contain. This guide covers what you can reuse for FLR(M), what to check before you do, and what genuinely needs translating fresh.
Often, but check them first. The extension (FLR(M)) is a leave to remain application, so under paragraph 39B of the Immigration Rules each translation must be certified by a qualified translator and state the translator's or company's credentials. Translations made for an entry clearance visa from abroad don't always include those.
A certified translation doesn't expire. It's tied to the document, not to the application, so if your marriage certificate is the same piece of paper you submitted from abroad, its translation is still an accurate rendering of it.
What changes is the standard the translation is measured against. Paragraph 39B of Part 1 of the Immigration Rules sets out what every translation must include: confirmation that it's accurate, the date, the translator's full name and signature, and their contact details. For applications made inside the UK, which covers the extension and later ILR, it adds two more: certification by a qualified translator, and details of the translator's or company's credentials. Your first visa was an entry clearance application, so it didn't need those two. The marriage hasn't changed; the dress code for its paperwork has.
So pull out the old translation and check it against the list below. If everything is there and the original document hasn't changed, reuse it. If the credentials or the qualified-translator certification are missing, get it redone before you apply. That's far cheaper than a request for further information arriving halfway through your leave.
Usually very few. Extension evidence mostly comes from your life in the UK: UK payslips, bank statements, council tax bills and tenancy agreements, all already in English. What still needs translating is anything from abroad: overseas income or savings, a child's foreign birth certificate, or a civil document reissued since your first application.
Your first application had to prove a relationship that mostly existed outside the UK, which is why it was so translation-heavy: a foreign marriage certificate, birth certificates, sometimes months of chat logs and overseas bank statements. By the time you extend, you've been living together here for over two years, and the proof of that is reassuringly dull and British: a joint tenancy, council tax bills addressed to you both, UK payslips. None of it needs translating.
For plenty of couples, the only foreign-language document in the extension file is the marriage certificate. The exceptions are worth knowing about, though. If the sponsor is relying on income or savings held abroad, those statements need certified translation, and our guides to bank statement translation and payslip translation for spouse visas still apply word for word. A child born abroad during the visa needs their birth certificate translated. So does any foreign paperwork behind a change of name.
If your first spouse visa application was made before 11 April 2024, transitional rules generally let you keep the £18,600 threshold for the extension. Applicants who entered the route on or after that date need £29,000. Either way, any financial evidence not in English needs a certified translation.
The jump from £18,600 to £29,000 in April 2024 worried a lot of couples already part-way through the route. The transitional arrangements mean that if you were already on the five-year partner route before the change, you can usually extend under the old threshold. Check the current Appendix FM guidance against your own dates before relying on it, as this area has moved more than once.
The threshold doesn't change what needs translating, but it can change how much. A sponsor who clears the figure comfortably on a UK salary has nothing to translate on the money side. A couple topping up with savings in a bank back home, or rent from a flat abroad, will have foreign statements, and those can run to many pages. Work out early which accounts and months you're actually relying on and translate only those.
No. Approved English tests (SELTs) issue certificates in English, so there's nothing to translate. The exception is if you meet the requirement with a degree taught in English from a non-English-speaking country and the certificate or transcript is in another language: that needs a certified translation.
The extension asks for English at A2, one step up from the A1 you showed for your first visa (ILR asks for B1, along with the Life in the UK test). The certificate from an approved test provider is issued in English, which makes it one of the few documents in this process that needs no help from anyone.
The edge case is the degree route. Some applicants meet the requirement with a degree taught in English, confirmed through Ecctis. If the certificate or transcript itself is in Spanish, Arabic or Mandarin, the Home Office still needs a certified translation of it, even though the course was taught in English. It feels contradictory, which is exactly why people miss it.
The usual problems are translations missing the in-country credentials, name spellings that no longer match your current passport or eVisa, a reissued certificate submitted with a translation of the old copy, and incomplete PDFs missing the statement of accuracy page.
Reusing a translation is usually fine. The trouble comes from things that have shifted around it in the meantime.
The first is the paragraph 39B gap above: a translation that was perfectly good for entry clearance but doesn't state the translator's credentials. The second is name drift. You renewed your passport and the transliteration changed, Mohammed became Muhammad, or a married surname was added. Now the old translation spells your name differently from your passport and eVisa record, and caseworkers notice. If you're getting anything redone, tell us the spelling on your current passport and we'll use it. Our guide to names spelled differently across documents covers the wider problem.
The third is the reissued certificate. If you've ordered a fresh copy from the registry back home, it may carry a new issue date, serial number or stamp, and the translation has to match the copy in front of the caseworker. The fourth is the humble missing page: a surprising number of people kept only page one of the PDF, which is rarely the page with the certification on it.
Yes, if they meet the in-country standard and the documents haven't changed. ILR applies the same paragraph 39B rules as the extension, so a translation that's right for FLR(M) can normally be reused at settlement. Anything new since, such as fresh bank statements or a child's birth certificate, needs translating.
This is the quiet advantage of getting the extension right: if you redo a translation to the in-country standard now, it should carry you through to settlement as well. You won't be paying for the same marriage certificate a third time.
ILR brings its own extra evidence, especially around time spent abroad, and we walk through it route by route in our ILR document translation checklist. For what the very first application needed, see the UK spouse visa translation guide and our walkthrough of marriage certificate translation for a spouse visa.
If you need anything translated fresh, our spouse visa translation service is £15.59 per page, delivered within 24 business hours, with a same-day rush option at £29.99 per page. Every translation states the translator's credentials, and every document includes two free revisions. Not sure whether an old translation still passes? Send it over on WhatsApp or by email and we'll tell you straight.
About the author
Felipe Menendez
Head of Translation, VisaDocTranslation
Felipe leads the translation team at VisaDocTranslation, overseeing certified translations for UK visa, Home Office and HMCTS submissions. He sets the quality standards every translation is checked against and writes about what UKVI caseworkers actually look for.
More about our teamNo. UKVI doesn't set an expiry date on certified translations. A translation stays usable as long as it's a complete, accurate translation of the exact document you're submitting and meets the format rules for the type of application you're making.
Not necessarily. If it's the same certificate and the existing translation is certified by a qualified translator and states their credentials, you can reuse it. If those details are missing, or the certificate has been reissued, get a new translation.
Your first visa was an entry clearance application made from abroad. The extension is a leave to remain application made inside the UK, and paragraph 39B of the Immigration Rules adds two requirements for those: certification by a qualified translator and a statement of the translator's or company's credentials.
Not in itself. What matters is that it meets the in-country standard and that the translator can still be contacted if UKVI wants to verify it. If the old provider has disappeared or the credentials aren't stated, a fresh translation removes the risk.
No. Documents issued in English or Welsh don't need translation. Only foreign-language evidence does, which is why the extension is usually much lighter on translation than the first application.
Generally yes, if your first spouse visa application was made before 11 April 2024 and you've stayed on the five-year partner route. Check the current Appendix FM rules against your own dates before applying, as this area has changed more than once.
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