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Anonymous VISA Experience – II (from Pakistan)

Dr. Naseer Khan

(This visa experience is important for two reasons:

  1. The applicant was unemployed.
  2. The applicant showed a month-long stay).

 

Greetings All,

I graduated in the year 2015 from Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi. My journey towards PLAB examination is mentioned as under.

 

USMLE to PLAB:

I am one of those who was very ambitious towards my USMLE journey and took all my exams within One year to apply for my residency in USA. But it wasn’t too late when I realized that my ambition and motivation is not what I want from inside but is all because of peer pressure and because of my seniors working in USA.

I also happen to have half of my family settled in USA including my sister so yes I was pressurized by my family too and by August 2016 I was not aware of any other option to chose other than USA.

Things turned and life changed after coming back from Hajj 2016 and Almighty showed me the right path and moulded my heart towards PLAB examination and things started going so smooth that I realized I should continue and try my luck here.

There were very few friends who actually were concerned as to why I shifted from the USA to the UK but majority mocked at me and made fun of me not being able to continue my USMLE journey. However, no one knows yet that it is all my decision to quit USMLE and start towards the UK just because I don’t feel like continuing it, trust me that’s the only reason (LOL).

 

IELTS:

After August 2016 I started gathering information as to what are the steps to be taken for PLAB examination. This is when I realized that IELTS exam is one of the biggest hurdles to even begin my journey.

Hence, I bought the Cambridge books started practicing them daily and regularly under timely conditions and booked my exam for November. Took my test and waited eagerly for the results. The result day came and I came to know my result is withheld by the IELTS body because they found some discrepancy in my result. Worried about losing the seats for March attempt I started calling and emailing the IELTS centre in Karachi and UK both.

Finally, after 3 weeks, my result was released and I scored a Band 8 cumulatively.  I was on the roof to look at my scores and got a boost to book for my exam.

 

PLAB 1:

I count myself in the lucky ones who did not need to study much for PLAB 1 examination having a sound and clear knowledge of topics because of my USMLE studies. So people mocking at me did not put me down but made me realize that maybe this half journey to USMLE was only so that I am prepared for PLAB 1 in no time and pass it with ease. Took the exam in March and came out confident and cleared it with a score of 150.

 

PLAB 2 Visa:

This needs a detailed review and I will try my best to cover all the necessary topics.

  1. Follow Dr. Naseer’s blog for the documents you need and follow them word to word.
  2. Get all your Urdu or native language documents translated beforehand in English
  3. Have your appointment booked at least a week apart after your application is submitted so that you have time to manage your documents if you have missed on any.

As mentioned above that you need to follow Dr. Naseer’s blog to add all your documents. I did the same and I made my cover letter as he did with the amendments needed as per my requirements.

I am not employed and I do not own a property other than a car which is gifted to me by my father.

 

Getting a PLAB 2 Visa While Being Unemployed

So it has been in the discussion if you can get a visa being unemployed or not. This is exactly that I was going through. I attached my documents in a proper A4 size (including prints of passports and clean copies of rest all documents).

My documents don’t really tell why I succeeded in getting a visa. The reason of my unemployment was mentioned in my cover letter, which included the details as under:

I graduate in April 2015. My House Job/Internship started in May 2015 and continued till May 2016. I had no break at all during this duration. I mentioned in my letter that I took my USMLE step 1 in August 2016 and step 2 CK in June 2016 and then I went to USA for Step 2 CS in July 2016. So this covered my reason for unemployment from May 2016 to August 2016 as I came back in August after Step 2 CS as I did my clinical attachment USA too (Attached a proof of it). In August 2016 after returning I went for Pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia and came back in September 2016. This covered my unemployment from Aug to Sep 2016.

Now I had to explain the unemployment between September 2016 to May 2017. Which I did by explaining why I no more wanted to continue in USA and shifting to PLAB. I gave the reason that I did not want to sign a contract with any hospital as then I would be bound to work with them and will not be possible for me to take my registration exams for which I have been working for the last 2 years approximately.

So now I mentioned that I took my IELTS exam in November and started preparing for PLAB 1. Got my result in month of December and booked my seat for PLAB 1 and started working hard and took the exam in March.

This is how I explained the duration of my unemployment in my cover letter.

 

Duration of Stay for the PLAB Trip

This is one of the most debatable topics of PLAB Visa. The reason being is that there have been so many cases where people have mentioned that they will travel for 5 days only and have mentioned their intended date of travel just a week before their exam and they ended up getting a visa right before their intended date of travel hence they were not able to take the courses that they have been registered for.

Keeping this in mind I decided to go with the truth and I mentioned my stay as to be a full one month stay which is what I had planned and decided.

I divided my stay into a timetable explaining each and everything of what I will be doing in that one month of time. (mentioned at the end)

Also, I was advised not to use Booking.com for the hotel reservation because it is a third party website and sends the name of the traveler only a day before arrival so if UK embassy decided to check on your booking and they call in the hotel, they will not be having your details and then you will be in trouble.

So I decided to pay a 30 percent fee to the hotel and booked it directly from the official hotel website.

 

Staying For 30 Days:

It is a single day exam, but it is not possible for me to travel to another country for an exam for one day. I will be visiting the UK for the first time in my life; therefore I need time to adjust to the surroundings. I also need time to prepare and to revise for my exam. This is how I am planning to spend my 30 days in the UK:

Day 01 20/Jun/2017 Arrival
Day 02 to 05 25/Jun/2017 Studying Medicine
Day 05 to 10 30/Jun/2017 Studying Surgery
Day 10 to 15 05/July/2017 Studying OBGYN
Day 15 to 20 10/July/2017 Studying Pediatrics
Day 21 11/July/2017 Studying Ophthalmology + ENT
Day 22 12/July/2017 Studying Examinations + Revision
Day 23 13/July/2017 Exam Day
Day 24 to 29 19/July/2017 Relaxation & Sight Seeing
Day 30 20/July/2017 Departure


Bank Account Details

The person who is sponsoring you must or better be someone whom you have had a good connection with and you know that person for a long time. Get an affidavit signed by that person.

The most important thing is that the bank account of this person must be very clean and shall only include the amount of money as per the salary certificate of that person. Do not inflate the amount in recent months because that will raise a question. On the other hand, it is possible for a high amount to come in but then you will have to make another affidavit and explain where did that money come from if that is not your income amount.

 

Documents I Attached:

(This post was originally written for my blog. It was shared by the writer’s permission)

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