UK Work Visa — Skilled Worker route
If a UK employer wants to hire you from abroad, they need a Home Office sponsor licence and you need a job that clears the salary bar for its occupation code. We check both before you spend a penny on the application, not after.
Who this route is for
The Skilled Worker visa is for people with a genuine job offer from a UK employer that holds a Home Office sponsor licence, in an occupation on the eligible list, at or above the required skill and salary level. It replaced the old Tier 2 (General) visa and remains the main route into UK employment for someone without European or family ties to the country.
The salary threshold, explained
Your salary has to clear whichever is higher of two figures: a general minimum threshold set by the Home Office, or the specific 'going rate' published for your occupation code — the median UK salary for that role, reviewed periodically by the Home Office rather than fixed once and forgotten. As of our last check against gov.uk, the general threshold sits at £41,700 a year, but a role with a higher going rate — many technical and professional occupations do — means that higher figure applies to you instead. Because this number moves, we check the current published threshold and your occupation's going rate before telling you whether a job offer clears the bar, rather than quoting a figure from memory.
Checking the sponsor is genuine
Only a UK employer holding a valid, current sponsor licence from the Home Office can sponsor a Skilled Worker visa — and that licence is verifiable, not something to take on trust from a job advert. The Home Office publishes a public Register of Licensed Sponsors on gov.uk, listing every organisation currently allowed to sponsor workers, along with its licence rating and the routes it can sponsor. We check your prospective employer against this register as one of the first things we do, because an unlicensed or suspended sponsor makes an application unwinnable however strong your own qualifications are.
Bringing your family
A Skilled Worker visa holder can usually bring a spouse, civil partner, unmarried partner, and dependent children as dependants on the same application or shortly after, provided the relationship and financial requirements for dependants are met. We handle dependant applications alongside the main one so the family arrives together rather than in staggered, separately-timed applications.
How we help
We start by checking your job offer against the current threshold and your prospective sponsor against the public register — an honest yes-or-no before any fee is paid. If the case is sound, we prepare the application, review the supporting evidence with you, and submit it. If a decision needs an administrative review or a fresh application, we stay engaged through that too.
- Cost range
- From £1,200 for a standard Skilled Worker application, more for complex cases (excludes the Home Office visa fee, the Immigration Health Surcharge, and the certificate of sponsorship your employer issues).
- Processing timeline
- Under the standard Home Office service, decisions on applications made from outside the UK usually arrive within 3 weeks; from inside the UK, within 8 weeks. A paid priority service can shorten either timeframe.
- If refused or appealing
- A Skilled Worker refusal does not usually carry a right of appeal. Depending on the reason given, you may qualify for an administrative review of a caseworking error, or your sponsor can issue a fresh certificate of sponsorship so you can reapply with the problem fixed.