‘I’ve spent seven years here, got married and built a business - now I could lose it all’

A woman who has lived in Manchester for four years and runs a business from Afflecks' Palace could be forced to leave the country, in an 'awful' visa mix-up.

Erin Taylor-Thomas, 26, moved to the UK seven years ago. She married husband Ethan in 2020 and they built a life here running a thriving thrift shop (Beg, Steal and Borrow) inside Afflecks Palace. The business is so successful that she was planning to open a second Withington branch.

But tragically she missed the expiry of her visa in February, and despite having spent nearly £7,000 applying twice for a new one, the Home Office have refused, recommending she return to a country she hasn’t called home since she was 19.

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She told the Manchester Evening News: “My whole life is here and I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if I didn’t have the support system and community that I do here. This is literally my home.”

Erin first came to the UK on a student visa in 2017. She studied a design degree at Arts University Bournemouth, where she met Ethan.

Now husband and wife, they live with their cat Sugar Cube in Withington. The pair are distraught at the prospect of being separated, but the Home Office say she has overstayed her visa and, unless she wins her appeal, they expect her to return to the US.

Erin made the discovery in April when she was searching for the documents that proved her right to rent.

“I pulled the document out of a drawer and was like, f**k, it’s expired," she said. "Immediately I panicked. My first thought was, I’ve messed everything up. I was inconsolable, I completely disassociated.”

Since being diagnosed with ADHD as a child, Erin said she has struggled