Traveling out of your home country would require you to have a visa, and there are various processes that are involved in the entire visa application process. Although many immigrants don’t have the financial support needed to sponsor their visa process, this is where sponsorship comes to play. In this article, we would be looking at how to get a visa sponsorship to work in the UK.
The UK is one of the best countries in the world to migrate to. This is why there is over 500,000+ visa application each year in the UK. Here is the breakdown of what we would be discussing in the article:
- What is UK visa sponsorship?
- What is a Certificate of Sponsorship (COS)?
- Types of Certificate of Sponsorship
- How to get a Certificate of Sponsorship
- How to get a Visa sponsorship to work in the UK
- Responsibilities of your UK visa sponsor
- Who cannot be sponsored to work in the UK
What is UK visa sponsorship?
This is the process whereby an individual or company takes up the responsibility of sponsoring a person to immigrate to the UK. In order to do this, they are given a certificate of sponsorship that allows them to sponsor individuals to work in the UK.
The UK employer that wants to hire a foreign workers in their organization will be asked to sponsor them in the visa application by giving them a certificate of sponsorship.
The reason for this certificate is to ensure that the employer is willing to monitor the foreign worker’s activities during the course of his/her work duration in the country.
What is a Certificate of Sponsorship (COS)?
A certificate of Sponsorship or COS for short is a piece of document that a sponsor is given in order to sponsor a person to immigrate into the country.
Types of Certificate of Sponsorship
Depending on how you want to immigrate to the UK, there are different types of COS that would be given to your potential sponsor.
- Certificate of Sponsorship for a skilled worker working long-term
- Certificate of Sponsorship for temporary workers working short-term
The first category of COS is meant for workers who are skilled and are thinking of coming into the UK on a permanent basis. Your potential sponsor would have to apply for such a certificate in order to sponsor your UK visa.
For the second category, this COS is assigned to sponsors who want to sponsor people into the UK on a permanent working basis.
How to get a Certificate of Sponsorship?
In order to get a COS, your sponsor would then need to fill in certain information needed for your sponsorship. Such information includes ID information, passport info, current home address, work address, etc.
The fee to be paid cost about £200 for the skilled workers and £21 for the temporary workers.
How to get a Visa sponsorship to work in the UK
After your sponsor has gotten a COS, they would need to process your visa application. They can do this by sending a petition to the USCIS for your visa process.
Your sponsor would need to provide certain documents which would be made known to him/her during the process of the application.
A total of £25,000 would be needed if they are sponsoring you for a skill job role in the U.K and about £8,000 if they are sponsoring you for a temporary job role in the UK. There are other sponsorship prices including £6,000 and £2,000 for more menial jobs in the UK.
Responsibilities of your UK visa sponsor
As a sponsor, there are requirements that are needed in order for you to be able to sponsor anyone to the UK. Below are some of the responsibilities of a UK sponsor:
- part-taking in a union or take-over
- Properly examine skills, education, and accreditations related to the job requirements
- The issuance of the CoS has to be for a suitable job for sponsorship
- Inform UKVI about any break of the visa conditions from the sponsored worker
- be informed about workers’ immigration status
- keep information and registers about workers’ presence in the workplace and inform IKVI in case of any unexplained absence
- update the contact information of the worker
- For any change in the business process – must inform UKVI within 20 working days, if any of the following happens to the sponsoring employer:
- Insolvency
- change in the business’ scope of work
Who cannot be sponsored to work in the UK?
There are certain individuals who are not qualified to be sponsored in the UK. The question now is who cannot be sponsored to work in the UK?
- People under the age of 18 of the above categories of workers
- People under the age of 16 for the second category of workers (unskilled workers)
How to Apply
To begin your visa sponsorship to work in the UK process, you would need to find a sponsor, after then visit the USCIS government website to apply.
