Hiring internationally is now a compliance discipline as much as a recruitment one — thresholds rising, sponsor duties tightening, and enforcement visits real. Connaught Law's business immigration solicitors act for employers, investors and senior executives across the UK: sponsor licences won and kept, workers sponsored correctly, and mobility planned around rules that change yearly.
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How We Can Help
Skilled Worker Sponsorship
Sponsoring a worker means getting role eligibility, going rates and the general salary threshold right — figures that have risen sharply and now must be met in every pay period, not just on annual average, one of several recent tightenings that catch sponsors out. We handle Certificates of Sponsorship, visa applications and the salary arithmetic, and we flag rule changes before they become compliance breaches.
Compliance, Audits & Enforcement
Sponsor duties — record-keeping, reporting, monitoring — are enforced by unannounced visits, and failures end in downgrading, suspension or revocation, taking your sponsored workforce with them. We run mock audits, fix gaps before the Home Office finds them, and where action has already started, our sponsor licence revocation service fights it on the timescales that work demands.
Executives & Global Mobility
Senior Executive transfers, Global Business Mobility routes for overseas businesses expanding or transferring staff to the UK, and the planning that goes with relocating leadership — family visas, schooling timelines, settlement strategy. For businesses setting up in the UK for the first time, we combine the corporate immigration with the commercial and property work under one roof.
Founders & Investors
The Innovator Founder route for entrepreneurs with endorsed businesses, and strategy for investors and high-net-worth individuals building a UK presence — where immigration is one strand of a plan that includes property, tax and family. Our global citizenship service covers the international options alongside the UK routes.
Right to Work
Every employer — sponsor or not — must check right to work correctly to hold the statutory excuse against illegal working penalties, which now run to serious money per worker. We set up compliant checking processes, advise on share-code and digital checks, and defend civil penalty notices where checks went wrong.
How We Work
For employers we work like an outsourced immigration function: licence and compliance health checked first, then sponsorship run to process — eligibility confirmed against the current Immigration Rules before any Certificate is assigned, and every change reported on time. Rules in this area now change more than once a year; part of the service is telling you what's coming before it lands.
For individuals — executives, founders, investors — we plan the route to settlement from day one, because the cheapest immigration strategy is the one that doesn't need redoing.
Why Connaught Law
01Licences that survive auditsWe build the compliance systems before the Home Office tests them — prevention beats representation.
02Current on every changeThresholds, pay-period rules, charge increases — sponsors hear it from us before it bites.
03Senior attention throughoutYour matters are run by our experienced immigration team, not passed down — with direct access to the person handling them.
04Business-wide viewImmigration, employment, property and tax in one firm — the whole relocation or expansion, not just the visa.
Fee structures are set out on our fees page — fixed fees for most defined applications, agreed before we start.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long does a sponsor licence application take?
Typically around eight weeks, with priority services sometimes available for faster decisions. The real timeline driver is preparation — evidencing your HR systems and documents properly before submission — because a refusal usually means a cooling-off period before you can reapply.
What salary must I pay a sponsored worker?
The higher of the general threshold and the going rate for the specific role — both revised repeatedly in recent years and now enforced per pay period rather than on annual average. Reduced thresholds exist for new entrants and some listed roles. We confirm the current figures for your exact role before any Certificate of Sponsorship is assigned.
What happens if we fail a Home Office compliance visit?
Outcomes range from an action plan to suspension or revocation — and revocation curtails your sponsored workers' visas, so the stakes are workforce-wide. Act at the first sign: representations during suspension save licences; after revocation the options narrow sharply and deadlines are short.
Can a small business get a sponsor licence?
Yes — there's no minimum size, and small sponsors pay lower fees. What matters is genuine roles at the required skill and salary levels, and HR processes that can carry sponsor duties. We regularly obtain licences for SMEs making their first international hire.
Hiring from overseas — or expanding into the UK?
Tell us what you're building. We'll map the licence, the sponsorships and the compliance — with costs agreed before anything starts.
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