In our previous blog, we explored two of five of the subcategories of the new Global Business Mobility (GBM) visa. In this blog we focus on the Secondment Worker route, discussing the key features and when this is most likely to be a useful route for businesses.
Secondment Workers
The Secondment Worker route has been introduced to allow international businesses to second workers to the UK to undertake temporary work assignments in connection with high value contracts or investments. There does not need to be any corporate link between the overseas and UK company (unlike the Senior or Specialist Worker GBM route or Graduate Trainee GBM route).
This is a completely new visa route introduced as part of the GBM reforms in April 2022; there was no equivalent route under the old Intra Company Transfer visa options.
Any businesses wanting to make use of this route will need to specifically apply to become a licensed sponsor in the Secondment Worker route. Alternatively, where the organisation already holds a GBM licence in other categories, they will need to apply to add this tier to their existing licence before they are able to use it.
Eligibility
To be eligible for a Secondment Worker visa, the individual in question must be an existing employee of an overseas organisation that has a high-value contract for investment or a contract for goods or services with a UK company. This contract must be worth at least £10 million per year, and no less than £50 million overall. The UK company will act as the employee’s sponsor in the UK.
Individuals can only be sponsored in connection with “approved” contracts. In other words, each specific contract needs to be lodged with, and approved by, the Home Office before any individuals can be sponsored under this route. Individuals can only be sponsored in connection with pre-approved contracts that meet the eligibility criteria.
Lodging the contract with the Home Office can either be done at the licence application stage or at a later stage via the Sponsorship Management System. Wherever possible it would be advisable for businesses to do this at the licence application stage, as any attempt to lodge the contract at a later date is likely to take a least 18 weeks (and there is no option to seek any sort of priority consideration when doing so). This potential delay needs to be factored in where businesses are thinking about using this route.
As for the other GBM routes, individuals must be undertaking a specifically skilled role and must have the required length of service with the overseas company to be eligible to apply (in this case 12 months). Unlike the Senior or Specialist Worker route, however, there is no “high earner exemption” to this overseas service requirement. In common with ither GBM routes, there is no minimum level of English language skill required.
Unlike other GBM routes, there are no minimum salary thresholds to be met and sponsored workers in this category need only be paid at least National Minimum Wage to be eligible.
Secondment Worker visas can be granted for an initial maximum period of 12 months, and it is possible to extend this by a further 12-month period. The total maximum time individuals can stay in the UK on a Secondment Worker visa is two years. (This is subject to the cumulative maximum time limits in all GBM categories which we discussed in our earlier article.)
As with all of the other GBM routes, this is a temporary route which does not lead to settlement in the UK. (However, individuals may be able to switch into another category which does lead to settlement, such as the Skilled Worker route.)
Who might need to use this route?
This route is potentially useful for any international businesses who have specific temporary needs in the UK in connection with high value contracts.
As an example of how this might be used:
A Chinese telecommunications business has a contract with a company in the UK for the development of a communications satellite and needs to send some of their own engineers on a year-long secondment to the UK in order to collaborate on the project. The contract has an overall value of £82 million.
The UK company applies for a GBM Secondment Worker licence and lodges the contract with the Home Office. The Home Office confirms that the contract meets the criteria. The UK company can then sponsor engineers to come to the UK under the Secondment Worker route to work on the contract for the required 12 month period. The Secondment Worker is not permitted to work on any other contracts whilst in the UK or take up any other employment.
It will be interesting to see in time whether this route proves accessible to businesses. When discussing the proposals for this route, the Migration Advisory Committee commented that the aim was to plug a gap in what was permitted under the visitor rules. However, given the value thresholds on the eligible contracts, they also commented that they “would expect to see no more than a handful of applications each year”. In reality, this route is likely to be of limited applicability and organisations may well need to look for other visa routes to meet their resourcing needs in the UK.
Look out for the next parts of our blog series in which we’ll cover the remaining two GBM routes – UK Expansion Worker and Service Suppliers.
If you have any queries regarding the new visa routes or need help with applying for/managing a sponsor licence application or making specific visa applications, please contact Laura Darnley or any member of our team of expert business immigration solicitors.
