I Have A Skilled Worker Visa And Want To Work In The USA For A Year, Is There Anything I Need To Be Aware Of?

If you currently hold a Skilled Worker visa and want to work overseas for a year, there are things that you must be mindful of.

The Skilled Worker visa is an immigration route that leads to permanent residence in the UK, also known as Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR). In order to be eligible for ILR, the Skilled Worker individual must have lived and worked in the UK for a continuous period of 5 years. There are some very limited exceptions regarding permissible time spent outside of the UK.

If you were to work for the same employer in its US entity, you must ensure that you spend no more than 180 days outside the UK in any rolling 12-month period in order to meet the continuous residence requirement.

If your position in the UK will be filled by another employee, or the position will no longer exist, it is likely that your employer will have to cancel your UK visa and you would need to apply for a new Skilled Worker visa before returning to the UK.

If you are leaving your current UK employer to take up a position in the US with a new employer, your UK employer will need to cancel your visa. You would then need to find a new sponsor and obtain a new Skilled Worker visa to return to the UK to work.

In almost all cases, as soon as you spend more than 180 days in a rolling 12-month period outside of the UK, you will break your continuous residence in the UK.

Of course, in addition to the continuous residence, those applying for ILR will also need to satisfy all other requirements of the UK immigration rules to secure approval of their Skilled Worker ILR application (i.e. salary, knowledge of Life in the UK, etc.).

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