UK employers have to be granted a sponsorship licence by the Home Office before they can employ non-UK resident workers under the new points-based visa system and routes such as the Skilled Worker visa.
Employers who do not hold a valid sponsorship licence will be unable to hire migrant workers coming to the UK after 1 January 2021, or extend visas for current sponsored employees.
All sponsors have to be fully aware of their immigration duties and have processes and systems in place to both meet these requirements and to maintain records as evidence of their compliance.
If applying for your first licence, your application will need to show you can meet these duties from day one. If the Home Office has concerns about your ability to comply, your application could be refused and you may lose your application fee.
Licence holders can be subject to Home Office investigation at any time. Where there are allegations of compliance breaches, the Home Office has powers to downgrade, suspend or revoke sponsor licences, impacting your ability to hire skilled migrant workers and impacting your sponsored workers’ permission to stay and work in the UK.