Expansion Worker Visa

The Global Business Mobility – UK Expansion Worker Visa is a sponsored route for overseas businesses that wish to establish a branch or subsidiary in the UK. The route allows eligible businesses to sponsor senior managers or specialist workers who are being assigned to the UK for a temporary period to undertake work related to the business’s expansion to the UK.

This article is primarily for employers looking to be authorised by the Home Office to sponsor a non-settled worker as a UK Expansion Worker. We provide guidance for employers as to the main general and route-specific requirements that they will need to satisfy in order to successfully apply for a UK Expansion Worker sponsor licence.

Who Needs to Be Sponsored on the UK Expansion Worker Route?

You will need to sponsor any overseas national you wish to employ to establish a branch or subsidiary in the UK if they are not a settled worker or do not otherwise have immigration permission to work for you in the UK. This includes most EU, EEA and Swiss nationals who arrived in the UK after 31 December 2020. In order to sponsor a UK Expansion Worker you will need to be authorised by the Home Office.

UK Expansion Worker sponsors can only sponsor the number of workers that they genuinely need to establish the UK business, up to a maximum of 5 workers at any one time. You will be able to replace individual workers within this allocation (for example, if a sponsored worker leaves your company or returns to their employer overseas) but you will not be permitted to sponsor more than 5 workers on the UK Expansion Worker route at any one time.

How to Apply for a UK Expansion Worker Sponsor Licence

In order to successfully apply for a UK Expansion Worker sponsor licence, you will need to satisfy various general and route-specific requirements.

General Requirements for a UK Expansion Worker Sponsor Licence

In terms of general requirements, you will need to satisfy the Home Office that:

• You are a genuine organisation operating lawfully in the UK;
• You are honest, dependable, reliable and are not engaging and have not engaged in behaviour or actions that are not conducive to the public good;
• You are capable of carrying out your sponsor duties and evidencing your compliance in a timeframe and manner set out in sponsor guidance.

Route-specific Requirements for a UK Expansion Worker Sponsor Licence

In terms of requirements that are specific to the UK Expansion Worker route, you will need to satisfy the Home Office that:

• You can offer employment which meets the skill level requirement for the UK Expansion Worker route;
• You can offer employment which meets the salary level requirement for the UK Expansion Worker route;
• The job(s) you are looking to sponsor is (are) genuine;
• You are not looking to sponsor a role which will involve working for a third party;
• There is a qualifying link between you (the sponsor) and the overseas business that will send workers to you;
• You are not already actively trading in the UK, but you have a UK ‘footprint’;
• The overseas business that is expanding to the UK is active and trading overseas and, unless an exception applies, has been active and trading for at least 3 years;
• You genuinely intend, and are able, to expand to the UK and establish a UK trading presence within two years;
• The planned expansion is in the same type of business that you conduct overseas;
• The business you are establishing in the UK is either wholly owned by the overseas business or is part of the same legal entity (such as a branch);
• You have appointed an Authorising Officer, Key Contact and at least one Level 1 User.

In the remainder of this article we explore these general and route-specific requirements in more detail.