Tier 2 Sponsorship licenses, the main pitfalls.
Tier 2 Sponsor licenses are obtained by UK businesses who wish to employ people from outside the European Economic Area. There are a number of reasons for this, but the primary reason must be that they are unable to fill the role with a UK resident.
Pitfall number one – Directors that are too busy.
In order for a company to have a Tier 2 license they must have a number of key personnel. These are the ‘Authorising Officer’ and the ‘Level 1 User’. These can be the same person, and usually are when the Tier 2 license is first applied for. The Authorising Officer is usually someone senior within the company, the problem with this is a senior person in an expanding company is that they are often extremely busy. Whilst we can cover a lot of the leg-work, there are some things we can’t do for the company, or Authorising Officer. There is a reasonable prospect that the Home Office will visit a company during the application process for a Tier 2 License or during the life of the license. The Home Office will expect that certain processes are in place in the company and will ask for documents which should be produced at the visit. They will also expect the Authorising Officer to have knowledge of their duties to the Home Office.
What we do
We provide a pack for Tier 2 license pack for Authorising Officers which outlines their duties and likely questions from Home Office representatives, we also offer an audit service where we go to offices and do a mock Home Office interview with feedback for the Authorising Officer following the visit.
Pitfall number two – Failure to keep the correct documents on file.
As holders of a Tier 2 license, companies are required to keep copies of leave to remain documents for their Tier 2 employees as well as other employees who are not on Tier 2, for example if any employees are on Tier 4 or have Indefinite Leave to Remain. Copies of both sides of biometric residence permits should be retained.
What we do
We providing an audit service to check that the correct documents are held and provide a full list of documents that must be kept in respect of employees.
Pitfall number three – Failure to notify the Home Office of changes such as of address, or when an employee leaves
There are number of actions which require the Tier 2 Sponsor to update the Sponsor Management System. For example if your Tier 2 employee receives a payrise, or works from another address, or leaves the company. There are timeframes in which to report certain changes and these are commonly missed by Tier 2 License holders
What we do
Once the license is granted, we will add ourselves as a Level 1 User to manage changes, although you would of course need to notify us of those changes in order for us to report them!