We are proud to share another success story from NARA Solicitors. This one shows how quickly life in the UK can be turned upside down, and how fast the right legal response can put it right.
Our clients, a husband and wife, were living lawfully in their apartment when Home Office enforcement officers raided the property. The officers were not looking for our clients at all. They were looking for someone else.
But what should have had nothing to do with our clients ended with both of them losing their right to live in the UK.
What Happened
Following the raid, the Home Office cancelled our clients' permission to stay in the UK with immediate effect.
Immediate effect meant exactly that. No 60 days to arrange their affairs. No time to consider their options or take advice at their own pace. From that day, they had no lawful status in the country they called home. And because the wife's status was linked to her husband's, her permission was cancelled too, based on the same flawed reasoning.
This was a frightening position for the couple. They had done nothing wrong. They were simply living in their own home when officers arrived searching for another person. They came to NARA Solicitors for urgent help.
Our Approach
There is no right of appeal against this type of cancellation. The route to challenge it is judicial review, which starts with a formal Pre-Action Protocol (PAP) letter before claim to the Home Office.
Our team reviewed the decision and the circumstances of the raid. We then sent a PAP to the Home Office within days, challenging the decision on three grounds:
Inadequate inquiry and an unsafe factual basis. The decision was made without proper investigation, off the back of an enforcement visit that was aimed at someone else entirely.
The immediate cancellation was irrational and contrary to the 60-day policy. Home Office policy is to give a person 60 days' notice when cancelling permission in circumstances like these, so they can regularise their position or prepare to leave. Cancelling with immediate effect ignored that policy without justification.
Procedural unfairness. Our clients were given no fair opportunity to respond to the concerns before the decision was made. And the wife's decision, as a dependant, was infected by the same errors as her husband's.
We asked the Home Office to withdraw the decision dated 16 June 2026 and put our clients back in the position they should have been in.
The Outcome
The Home Office responded to our PAP within two weeks. The immediate cancellation decision was withdrawn, and our clients got their permission to stay back.
No court proceedings were needed. A well-argued Pre-Action Protocol challenge, sent quickly and grounded in the Home Office's own policy, was enough.
The relief for our clients was enormous. Their lives, their home and their plans in the UK were back on track.
This case is a reminder that an enforcement raid can affect you even when you are not the target, and that a decision to cancel permission with immediate effect can be unlawful where the Home Office's own policy requires 60 days' notice. Time limits for challenging these decisions are strict, so acting fast matters.
You can read more of our results on our success stories page.
How NARA Solicitors Can Help
At NARA Solicitors, we act for individuals and families facing visa cancellations, curtailments and refusals, as well as businesses dealing with sponsor licence problems. We prepare Pre-Action Protocol and judicial review challenges against unlawful Home Office decisions, and we move quickly when a decision takes effect immediately.
If your visa has been cancelled or curtailed, or the Home Office has made a decision you believe is wrong, do not wait. Book a consultation with NARA Solicitors today.
