The UK Government yesterday published its Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules that come into effect on March 30th 2019, radically changing the landscape of business immigration in the Country. Immigration Minister Caroline Nokes MP, published her own statement commenting on the reasons these changes are being brought into effect. Whilst these changes cover a wide range of immigration areas, such as Settlement and Tier 1 Investor visas, we are pertinently focused on the changes that have an impact on the existing Tier 1 Graduate Entrepreneur and the Tier 1 Entrepreneur visas.
Both the Statement of Changes itself and the accompanying Memo are fairly unwieldy documents and not particularly well put together, nor formatted, however, with perseverance and a particularly deep delve, you can find some very interesting pieces of information, which we have bulleted for you:
- The existing Tier 1 Entrepreneur visa route will effectively cease to exist on March 29th 2019.
- The Current Tier 1 Graduate route will remain open until July 5th 2019, as existing Endorsement Letters are valid for 3 months and can be issued up until the 5th April 2019.
- The Tier 1 Graduate Entrepreneur visa is being replaced with the Start-Up visa on March 30th 2019.
- The Tier 1 Entrepreneur visa is being replaced with the Innovator visa on March 30th 2019.
Tier 1 Graduate Entrepreneur Visa
Some of the main changes cited are:
- No requirement to be a graduate
- No funding need be secured
- Successful applicants will be granted 2 years’ leave, doubled from the existing 1 year
- The £50,000 funding requirement to switch to the Innovator visa will be waived
Tier 1 Entrepreneur Visa
Some of the main changes cited are:
- Applicants will need only invest £50,000 instead of the current £200,000
- This investment requirement is waived if switching from the Start-Up category of visa
Both of the new visa categories will have two central requirements, the first of which is to be endorsed by a ‘UK Trusted Body’ and the second of which is to have “a genuine, original business plan that meets new or existing market needs and/or creates a competitive advantage”.
Here at Greengate Business Associates, in the past 18 months, we have helped over 50 applicants get their Tier 1 visas granted with our tailored, bespoke business plan services – so we are very confident that we can help you with the second of those two central requirements outlined above. We’re still poring over the documentation, but feel free to get in touch if you have any questions.