Regulation, complaints and privacy

IAA Level 1 is "Advice and Assistance". It covers straightforward applications made within the Immigration Rules, where the facts meet the qualifying criteria and there is no immigration history likely to cause a problem — for example applications for entry clearance or permission to stay, family, visit, work and study applications, EU Settlement Scheme applications, basic British citizenship applications and sponsor licence applications.

Under our current Level 1 Immigration service scope, WLIS does not undertake administrative reviews, appeals, tribunal representation, immigration bail, asylum, human-rights or discretionary casework, or cases involving adverse immigration history such as overstaying, illegal entry, removal or deportation.

We provide advice and application assistance for straightforward immigration matters within our IAA Level 1 Immigration authorisation. Where a matter falls outside that authorisation — for example because it involves adverse immigration history, a discretionary or human-rights claim, an administrative review, an appeal or tribunal work — we will tell you and signpost or refer you to an adviser authorised at the appropriate level.

If an application is refused, we will explain whether a new straightforward application may fall within our Level 1 service scope. Where review, appeal, tribunal or other higher-level work is required, we will signpost or refer you to an appropriately authorised adviser.

If you are unhappy with our service, please tell us so we can try to put it right. Making a complaint will not affect how we treat you or your application.

• Write to us by email or by post to our registered office, with your name, any reference we have given you and what went wrong.
• We will acknowledge your complaint in writing and tell you who is dealing with it.
• We will investigate it and send you a written response explaining what we found and what we will do.
• If you are not satisfied with that response, you can ask for it to be reviewed by the person responsible for the practice.

Complaints by email: info@wlisuk.com

You can also complain directly to the Immigration Advice Authority (IAA), which handles complaints about regulated immigration advisers. How to complain to the IAA (opens on GOV.UK in a new tab).

West London Immigration Services Limited is the data controller for the personal information described below. This section explains what this website collects, where it goes and how long we keep it.

This privacy notice was last updated on 26 September 2026.

If you send us an enquiry from this site

The enquiry form on our contact page asks for your name, your email address and what has happened, and optionally your telephone number and the service your question is about. We use it to answer your enquiry and to decide whether we can act for you.

• Your enquiry is stored on this website so we can pick it up and answer it, and a copy is emailed to our office.
• We also record the IP address and browser the enquiry was sent from. That is used only to detect and block automated abuse of the form.
• We keep enquiries that do not become instructions for up to two years, then delete them. If you become a client, your information forms part of your client file (see below).
• We do not sell your information and we do not use it for marketing.

The anti-spam check on the enquiry form

The enquiry form carries a reCAPTCHA tick box, provided by Google, which stops the form being used by automated scripts. Without it the form is flooded, and genuine enquiries are missed among the noise. We rely on our legitimate interest in keeping the form usable and our office secure.

• Ticking the box sends your IP address and information about how you used this page to Google, who decide whether you appear to be a person rather than a script. Google may set cookies on your device to make that decision.
• This happens only on the pages that carry the enquiry form, and only Google receives it. Nothing you have typed into the form — your name, your message or your contact details — is sent to them.
• We are told the answer, not the reasoning, and we do not keep it. The result is used to decide whether to accept that one submission, and nothing else.
• Because it protects the form itself, this check runs whether or not you accept optional cookies. If you would rather not use it, telephone, WhatsApp or email us instead — those routes reach us directly.

Google's own privacy notice (opens in a new tab) and terms of service (opens in a new tab) apply to what they do with it.

If you open one of our service enquiry forms

Several service pages open a form on enquiry.wlisuk.com instead. That is a separate WLIS site, and pressing the button takes you off this one. Nothing about you is passed across when you click: this website has no record of who you are at that point, and it sends nothing with you.

• What you then type into that form is submitted to our case management system, which is operated by WLIS and used to run client matters.
• We remain the data controller for it, and the same retention and confidentiality obligations apply as for any other enquiry.
• If you have accepted optional cookies, we record that a form was opened and which service page it was opened from. We do not record who opened it.

Cookies

We set a small number of cookies that are necessary to run the site, including one that remembers the cookie choice you made, so we do not have to keep asking. These are always on because the site does not work without them.

Optional cookies measure which pages and services people use, so we can improve them. They are only set if you accept them, and nothing optional loads before you answer. You can change your answer at any time using the cookie choices link in the footer.

If you become a client

To prepare an immigration application we need personal information that can include passport and identity details, your immigration history, family, employment and financial information, and sometimes health information or other special category data. We use it to provide the advice and application assistance you instruct us on, under our contract with you and our legal and regulatory obligations; special category data is used only where it is needed for your application and the law allows it. The client care letter you receive explains this in more detail.

In accordance with IAA regulatory requirements, client files and records are retained for at least six years after the matter closes, after which they are securely deleted or destroyed unless another legal requirement requires a longer period.

Who else sees your information

• We send information to UK Visas and Immigration and the Home Office, and to any visa application centre involved, only as needed for an application you have instructed us to make, or where the law requires it.
• Our suppliers, such as our hosting, email and case management providers, process information on our instructions and cannot use it for their own purposes.
• Our regulator, the Immigration Advice Authority, may inspect client files as part of its regulation of advisers.

Automated decisions

We do not make decisions about you that have legal or similarly significant effects by automated means, and we do not profile you. The enquiry form's automated spam checks decide only whether to accept that one submission; if yours is not accepted, you can reach us by telephone or email instead.

Keeping your information secure

This website uses encrypted (HTTPS) connections, and access to enquiries and client information is limited to the people at WLIS who need it to deal with your matter. Please do not send identity documents through this website or by messaging apps.

Your rights

Under UK data protection law you have the right to ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you, and to ask us to correct it or delete it where we are not required to keep it. You can also ask us to restrict how we use it, object to our use of it where we rely on our legitimate interests, and, where it applies, ask for information you gave us in a portable format. Where we rely on your consent, you can withdraw it at any time. Some rights do not apply in every case, for example where we must keep a client file for the regulatory period.

To use any of these rights or ask about your information, write to us at info@wlisuk.com and we will respond within one month. If you are not satisfied with our response, you may complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk (opens in a new tab).