Sponsorship License Audits

Obtaining a sponsor licence, required to sponsor foreign workers or students to come and work or study in the UK, is a new HR responsibility that needs be taken seriously to both keep your licence and maintain your present and future foreign originated workforce.

Sponsor licence applications can take several months to be processed due to document gathering, selection of licence type, candidate review and UK Visas & Immigration (UKVI) own timelines. Employers work to keep thier top staff, although Brexit has led to a reduction in skilled worker availability, meaning HR teams  are having to spend more time on fulfilling recruitment objectives.

Maintaining staff is already challenging for businesses, but for businesses with a sponsor licence, compliance with Home Office regulations creates further concern about potentially losing licences.

The Home Office conducts compliance visits prior to application approval, but can also make unannounced visits after the licence is granted. This can disrupt daily operations, cause concern for your foreign and domestics workers, impact your market perception, and lead to licence removal. A licence removal will terminate each sponsored workers visas connected to your business.

Unfortunately, many UK businesses have failed such visits resulting in revoking of licences and fining. Even if the investigation is later proven to be in order, potential reorganisation, engaging legal assistance and loss of staff is costly to any business.

Fines from UKVI are serious penalties from £20,000 for each illegal worker, criminal sanctions, downgrade of licence and the publishing of your business name on a public list of employers with civil penalties.

HR teams are typically versed in traditional day-to-day work patterns, but constant changes in immigration law and compliance rules, and resulting new procedures creates high risk areas in company policy and procedures.

Our team offers mock audits to review your HR policy and procedures in relation to UKVI requirements. This will give the business the opportunity to spot issues and concerns that could result in licence disruption. The audit allows you to fulfil your requirements by making improvements to ensure unannounced visits are successful, new allocations have better approval opportunities and renewals have better approval chances.

Taking the time to completea mock audit will avoid negative impacts froma UKVI licence visit and potential revocation of your licence.

Please contact to discuss how we can assist your HR team.