FOR BUSINESSES

Corporate Immigration

Consistently recognised as a leader in UK corporate immigration, our team of experts are adept at providing custom immigration strategies and support to help Human Resource departments to hire, and retain, the best talent required for their individual growth needs.

The corporate immigration team works closely with businesses and organisations to understand their requirements and future plans. We help our clients navigate the complex UK immigration system and mitigate any risks imposed by the ever-changing immigration rules and associated guidance.

We advise on the best options for employing overseas nationals and the visa routes to meet their needs most efficiently. Focusing on our clients’ unique set of circumstances, we offer bespoke and tailor-made advice.

Some of the services that we provide to our corporate immigration clients are listed below:

  • Skilled Worker Sponsor Licence applications
  • Global Business Mobility Sponsor Licence applications
  • Sponsor Licence management
  • Sponsor Licence renewals
  • Sponsor compliance and monitoring support
  • Right to work checks compliance
  • Sponsor Licence suspension and revocations

Work Visas

Our team of experts have successfully handled a large number of, frequently complex, visa application cases ranging from Business Visit visas to International Sportsperson and Representative of an Overseas Business visas.

There are a large number of visa options available to businesses and individuals wanting to work in the UK. Some of the categories in which our team have extensive experience are as follows:

  • Visit visas for business purposes and permitted paid engagements
  • Skilled Worker visas
  • Global Business Mobility visas, including Expansion Worker visas
  • Tier 5 and Temporary Work visas
  • International Sportsperson visas
  • Scale-Up visas

Visit visas for business purposes and permitted paid engagements

If you are a ‘visa national’, you will be required to apply for a Visit Visa before you travel to the UK. There are around 115 countries on the Home Office’s ‘visa national’ list, including Russia, China and India.

‘Non-visa nationals’ (i.e. citizens of the countries not included in the ‘visa national’ list) are not required to apply for a visa prior to travelling to the UK as a visitor. However, non-visa nationals must still meet all of the requirements for a Visit Visa, and they will be assessed on entry to the UK.

If you are visiting the UK on business, you are allowed to:

  • Attend meetings, conferences, seminars and interviews;
  • Give a one-off or short series of talks and speeches provided these are not organised as commercial events and will not make a profit for the organiser;
  • Negotiate and sign deals and contracts;
  • Attend trade fairs (for promotional work only and without any direct selling);
  • Carry out site visits and inspections;
  • Gather information for your employment overseas; and
  • Be briefed on the requirements of a UK based customer.

For any paid engagements you must be able to show that:

  • you have been formally invited by a UK-based organisation to attend a pre-arranged event or other permitted engagement;
  • the event or engagement relates directly to your expertise, qualifications and main job in your home country;
  • you are 18 or over;
  • you are visiting the UK for no more than 1 month;
  • you will leave the UK at the end of your visit;
  • you are able to support yourself during your trip (or have funding from someone else to support you);
  • you are able to pay for your return or onward journey (or have funding from someone else to pay for the journey);
  • you will not live in the UK for extended periods through frequent or successive visits, or make the UK your main home.

Skilled Worker

A Skilled Worker visa gives you permission to live in the UK and work for your employer for up to 5 years. If you have a partner or children under 18, they may be able to join you too. After 5 years’ continuous residence in the UK under the Skilled Worker route you (and your family) may be eligible to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain (i.e. permanent residence) in the UK and, thereafter, British citizenship.

The general minimum salary threshold for Skilled Worker visas ranges from £20,960 to £26,200; however, the minimum salary relevant to your visa application may be much higher depending on your occupation code and the number of hours you will be working.

The role that you will be carrying out must be at or above the minimum skill level, which is Regulated Qualifications Framework (RQF) 3, equivalent to UK A-Level. You will need to meet the English language requirement.

If the UKVI deems that you have not met the eligibility criteria, or if any of the requirements regarding the process or documentation have not been met, the application may be refused.  Our team will work diligently with you to ensure that your applications are successful.

Global Business Mobility

Expansion Worker visas

An Expansion Worker visa allows an overseas entity to designate a senior employee to come to the UK in order to set up and run a new branch or subsidiary. Generally, the overseas entity must have been actively trading for at least 3 years and the senior employee working for that entity for at least 12 months.

Graduate Trainee visas

This visa route is for foreign workers who are seeking to be transferred to the UK by their employer for a work placement as part of a graduate training course leading to a senior managerial or specialty post. The overseas and UK entities must be linked by common ownership or control.

Secondment Worker visas

A Secondment Worker visa allows overseas workers to undertake temporary work assignments in the UK, where the worker is being seconded to the UK as a part of a high value contract or investment by their employer overseas.

Senior or Specialist Worker visas

A Senior or Specialist Worker visa allows overseas workers to undertake temporary work assignments in the UK, where the worker is an existing senior manager or specialist employee and is being assigned to a UK business linked to their employer overseas by common ownership or control.

Service Supplier visas

The Service Supplier route is for overseas workers who are undertaking temporary work assignments in the UK, where the worker is either a contractual service supplier employed by an overseas service provider or a self-employed independent professional based overseas, and the work is part of a contract covered by one of the UK’s international trade agreements.

Tier 5 and Temporary Work visas

The Creative Worker Sponsor Licence is specifically designed to allow organisations in the UK to sponsor individuals to undertake a job, or a series of engagements, within the creative sector, in areas such as dance, music, film, theatre, television, circuses, opera and fashion modelling.

The route covers creative workers and also their entourage.

As such, organisations in the creative sector are permitted to sponsor individuals to undertake fixed, usually short-term, assignments in the UK. Individuals can also be sponsored for a series of engagements in the UK, as long as there is no more than 14 days between each.

Creative Workers can only be sponsored for up to 12 months initially; however, this period can be extended to 24 months, provided the individual continues to work for the same sponsor. Sponsors wishing to sponsor workers in the creative industry for longer than 24 months should instead, consider the Skilled Worker route.

International Sportsperson visas

If you wish to sponsor someone under the International Sportsperson route:

  • You must have a ‘genuine vacancy’, i.e. a job your organisation needs to fill;
  • The job must be at a minimum required skill level (equivalent to RQF 3, or A Level standard);
  • The salary must be at least £10.75 an hour (but potentially higher than this depending on the type of vacancy);
  • As the employer you must also have an International Sportsperson Sponsor Licence, or be prepared to apply for one.

Scale-Up visa

If your UK-based business is rapidly expanding, and you are looking to recruit highly-skilled individuals to help your drive the business growth, you may consider sponsoring a candidate under the Scale-Up Visa route. The candidate will be committed to working for the UK business for at least 6 months.

In order to sponsor a candidate for a Scale-Up visa, the UK business first needs to obtain a Sponsor Licence under the Scale-Up category. As part of the Sponsor Licence application, the Home Office will have to assess your UK business. They will evaluate how its turnover and staff count have evolved year-over-year to establish if your business is ‘rapidly expanding’.

Individuals sponsored under this visa route will need to demonstrate that the UK business will be paying them a minimum gross annual salary of £34,600 or the going rate for the job they are hired to do (whichever is higher), and that they are able to speak, read, write and comprehend English to an intermediate standard (B1 Level).

The Scale-Up visa will be initially granted for a period of 2 years, and the visa holder will be expected to work for the UK business that has sponsored them for at least the first 6 months of their visa.

It may then be possible to extend the visa for a further period of up to 3 years, provided that the individual has been employed by their Scale-Up sponsor for at least 6 months and has subsequently continued to work in the UK at the applicable salary rate.

The dependent partner and children, who are under the age of 18 at the date of initial application, can also join the Scale-Up migrant in the UK.

After 5 continuous years of residence in the UK under this visa route, it may be possible to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain.