Immigration appeals that rest on family life need evidence about that family life, and most of the time nobody in the case is qualified to give it. The solicitor cannot give evidence. The family's own account, on its own, gets called self-serving. What the tribunal needs is an independent professional who has actually sat with the family, tested what they say, and written it up against the legal questions the judge has to answer.
That is what I do. I am an independent social worker with fifteen years in child and family practice, more than thirteen of them since qualifying, and over 250 independent assessments behind me. Most of my work is in the Family Court, where reports are challenged line by line and experts are cross-examined on them. I bring the same standard to the tribunal.
The reports I provide
Carer and dependency reports. When your client's case rests on the care they give or receive, the tribunal needs more than a statement saying the family is close. I assess what is actually provided, day by day, whether anyone else could realistically provide it, and what removal would mean for the person who depends on it.
Family impact of deportation. The "unduly harsh" test is about this child and this partner, not children and partners in general. I assess each child individually: their needs, their attachments, their care arrangements, and what each scenario the tribunal must consider would actually do to them.
Best interests of the child. Where a child's welfare is central to an appeal or application, I provide the structured best-interests analysis the law requires, built on the same welfare framework used in the Family Court every day.
Sole responsibility and adult dependent relative reports. For entry clearance cases that turn on care arrangements, including assessment of family members overseas by video.
How I work
I read everything you send me, including any family court material, and my report engages with it. I meet the family, usually more than once, and I test what I am told against records and observation. Where a client is detained, I visit. Where an interpreter is needed, I work with one and say so in the report. Every report complies with the Practice Direction: twenty pages, expert declarations, and my duty to the tribunal stated plainly.
Standard delivery is eight weeks from instruction, papers and initial payment. If your hearing is closer than that, ask; urgent instructions are sometimes possible at a supplement, and I would rather tell you an honest no than a comfortable maybe.
Send me the refusal letter and the hearing date and I will tell you within one working day whether a report would help, what it would cost, and when you would have it.
Send the outline →Fees
One fee, whatever the type of report: £1,750, fixed and agreed at instruction. Travel is charged at £28 an hour and 55p a mile. Prison visits, overnight stays and interpreters are charged at cost. All of it is set out in writing before the work starts, so the invoice at the end is the figure you were quoted at the beginning. Half of the report fee is payable on instruction and the balance before the report is released.
Fees are for privately funded instructions. Legal aid is not available for most Article 8 family and private life appeals, which is why a fixed fee matters: your client knows the cost before committing to it.
Travel, and how to keep it down
Travel is the one part of the cost that moves, and it moves according to how the assessment is done. I am based in the North East and work across England and Wales. A client in Manchester or Leeds is a day trip; a client in London or the South West may need an overnight stay; a client in prison means a visit at the establishment, on the day the prison offers. Every leg is costed from the diary before you instruct me, so you see the travel figure alongside the report fee and not after it.
Where the budget is tight, the assessment can be shaped to suit. Interviews with the appellant can take place by video link, including from prison where the establishment offers it, and I can see the partner and children at home on a single day rather than over two. Some clients choose a fully remote assessment, with every interview by video and the home seen on camera. I will tell you honestly what each option gives up: a home seen on a screen is not the same as a home walked through, and a tribunal may say so. But the choice is the client's, and I set out the cost of each option side by side so that it can be made with the figures in front of you.
Once the format is agreed, the travel figure is fixed with the fee. If the format changes later at the client's request, the figure is revised once, in writing, before the change is made.
What the fee buys
Cheaper reports exist. The difference is almost always the work behind the page rather than the page itself, so it is worth being clear about what a report from me involves. A typical instruction runs to forty hours or more, and every one of them goes into the evidence.
The whole bundle read, not skimmed.
The refusal letter, the witness statements, the sentencing remarks where there are any, the medical evidence, school records and any family court material. I engage with what the Home Office has actually said, so that the report answers the case as it stands rather than the case in general.
The appellant interviewed properly, wherever they are.
A full session, in person where possible. If your client is detained, I book the professional visit myself, obtain the establishment's authorisation, and go. Interviews are structured, and every adverse point in the bundle is put to the person it concerns so that their answer is on the record.
The family seen at home.
A home visit with the partner, the children and any dependent relative, where the care actually happens. I see the routines, the sleeping arrangements, the medication, the school run, and who does what for whom. That is what turns a claim of dependency into evidence of it.
The relationship observed, not just described.
Where the case turns on a child's bond with a parent, I watch them together, in person or by video where the parent is detained, and I record what I see against what I have been told.
The account tested against other people and other records.
Schools, GPs, health visitors, therapists, probation officers, employers and other family members are contacted with consent, and what they say is compared with the family's account. Where records support the account, the report says so. Where they do not, it says that too.
Each scenario the tribunal must consider assessed separately.
For a deportation appeal, that means what would happen to each child and to the partner if the family stayed in the United Kingdom without the appellant, and what would happen if they went with him or her. Each child is treated as an individual, with their own needs, attachments and vulnerabilities set out and weighed.
Analysis written to the legal test in the instruction.
Unduly harsh, very compelling circumstances, best interests under section 55, dependency beyond the ordinary emotional ties, or the care arrangements behind sole responsibility. The report is organised around the questions the tribunal has to answer, and it draws on the same welfare framework I apply in the Family Court every week.
A report that complies with the Practice Direction.
Expert declarations, my duty to the tribunal stated plainly, the range of opinion acknowledged, the sources of every fact identified, and a statement of truth. Twenty pages or thereabouts, written to be read by a judge in an afternoon.
Availability afterwards.
Written answers to questions from the parties, and attendance at the hearing if the tribunal wants oral evidence, at £42 an hour.
If your case does not need that depth, I will say so at the enquiry stage rather than sell you a report you do not need.
Instructing me
Send a short outline of the case and the hearing date to vince@socialworkassessment.com or call 0191 716 5069. I will tell you within one working day whether I can take it, what it will cost, and when you will have it.