Still no 173 visa :-(

[freedy50]

Sorry if this is a bit long.

Applied for a 173 Parent Visa for me and my wife back in June 2015 through an agent. In the middle of this March we were told to get medicals and police checks. Police checks were fine and went for medicals on 31^st March. Mine was fine, however, it was found that my wife had a large lump in her stomach. After various visits to doctor and hospital it was eventually found in late April she has to have her gallbladder taken out and was told an NHS appointment could take about 2 months to come through which could possibly be before the end of this month. Private would have been too expensive. The Australian Emedical people wanted reports which they had and was told the prognosis for the next 5-10 years would be good.

While my wife hasn’t had her operation yet, it’s been nearly 4 months since the medicals and not heard anything further about a visa. Even our agent doesn’t know anything further. I’ve checked at various times on the email address that you can send an email to and you get an automated reply advising what date they're processing up to, but in the last few days there has not been any response to emails sent. On the Global Visa Processing Times website all it says is “173 Contributory Parent (Temporary) Unavailable due to low volume of applications.” which isn’t very helpful. There doesn’t even seem to be a way of contacting the Immigration people directly. The last I saw was that they were up to 5th May 2015.

We’re just two ordinary parents with no ties now in the UK, with an uncomplicated visa application, that just want to go and live with our only son and daughter in law especially since we could become grandparents while there.

Does anyone know if this is normal in these circumstances and how much longer it could take?