Roll up, roll up………..
If you are thinking about moving to the UK, you have the main visa options below to allow you to work and live in the UK. You can bring partners or spouses and children up to the age of 18 with all these visas.
The UK is an easy place to start a business. The only difficult things to deal with are opening a bank account and the occasional lack of sunshine.
- Sponsor licence and skilled worker visa
- Business Expansion Worker Visa
- Innovator Founder Visa
- Global Talent Visa
- High Potential Individual visa
- Minister of Religion visa
1 Sponsor Licence and Skilled Worker visa
You need a company that is trading to have a sponsor licence. It can then sponsor skilled workers to be employed in the company. 5 years of this visa enables you to apply for indefinite leave to remain (ILR), the equivalent of the green card.
You can set the company up and be sponsored by it as opposed to looking for work with a company already set up. The difficulty with setting it up yourself is opening the right type of bank account.
2 Business Expansion Worker visa
You need a company that has been trading in your home country (where the election hasn’t gone well) for at least 3 years. It must set up a UK dormant company and it can sponsor you. You don’t need to worry about having to open a UK bank account for this visa. The visa lasts for 1 or 2 years but the route does not lead to settlement. You will need to switch into another visa eg the skilled worker visa.
3 Innovator Founder visa
This route is for a person seeking to establish a business in the UK based on an innovative, viable and scalable business idea you have generated, or to which you have significantly contributed towards.
Applicants will be granted a 3-year visa following which you can apply for ILR. The family must wait 5 years to apply for ILR.
4 Global Talent visa
This route is for people aged 18 or over in the field of academia or research, digital technology or arts and culture who can show that they have exceptional talent or exceptional promise.
Applicants will be granted a 3-year visa following which you can apply for ILR. The family must wait 5 years to apply for ILR.
5 High Potential Individual visa
The High Potential Individual visa is available to recent graduates of top global universities who want to work, or look for work as an employee or as a self employed person in the UK, following the successful completion of an eligible course of study equivalent to UK bachelor’s degree level or above.
You must have, in the last 5 years, been awarded an overseas degree level academic qualification which Ecctis confirms meets, or exceeds the recognised standard of a UK bachelor’s or UK postgraduate degree, and it is obtained from an institution that appears on the Global Universities List in respect of the date you were awarded the degree.
In the 2024 Global List, 20 of the top 50 universities are US ones.
PhD or other doctoral level qualification – the visa is for 3 years. All other degree qualifications – the visa is for 2 years
The route does not lead to settlement and you will need to switch.
6 Minister of Religion visa
Even if your prayers failed to make an impact in the election, you may still think that the prayer route is the best visa route for you.
You will need to be sponsored by a faith community in the UK. The visa can be for a maximum of 3 years and 1 month and can be extended to 5 years when you can apply for ILR.
At which point your prayers will have been answered – hallelujah.
Tom Redfern tredfern@redfernlegal.com
