Home Office errors relating to pay rates for skilled workers could lead to costly overpayments for those recruiting overseas talent, businesses have been warned.
Immigration recruitment platform Immpact is urging employers not to be caught out after mistakes were made with figures published in the Immigration Rules.
In the past week, the Home Office admitted that some salary “going rates” included in March 2024 statement of changes to the immigration rules HC 590 were wrong and advised sponsors when issuing sponsorship certificates under the skilled worker route to instead refer to guidance updated on 10 July 2024.
Now a new investigation by Immpact has revealed that the Immigration Rules published in April 2024 contained 77 errors within 33 job codes – with one suggesting a sponsor pay almost £20,000 above the correct amount.
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Immpact is therefore advising employers that since the rules are only being update in the autumn, they need to be aware of the issue to avoid using the wrong pay rates.
The company also highlighted that the mistakes could also lead to employees with similar jobs to be paid widely different wages based on incorrect data, or a loss of talent if people are rejected because the wrong salary rate outlined in the Immigration Rules is believed to be too high.
The job codes impacted included senior fire, ambulance and prison officers, as well as probation officers, roofers, scientists and youth workers.
Immigration expert Jonathan Beech, founder and managing director of Immpact, said: “If the April 2024 skilled worker rule changes weren’t complicated enough, the Home Office has now admitted errors made with the published ‘going rates’ shown in the Immigration Rules. Our investigation has found these errors could prove extremely costly for businesses and have other serious consequences, especially with one error we found requiring a sponsor to pay nearly £20,000 above the corrected rate if an employer is unaware.
“Calculating the correct range of pay for skilled workers can be difficult. For those not paid at the minimum level or higher, the result can be an application for refusal which in turn leads to a loss of Home Office fees that can run into thousands.”
Explaining that while for in-country applications, a refusal will lead to the loss of a Certificate of Sponsorship, Beech said this could mean that the employer must issue another one should they want to make a subsequent application with the correct information, which can only happen if the employer has an existing allocation of Certificates.
He said: “If they need to request an extra allocation from UK Visas & Immigration (UKVI), the wait time can run into months – by which time the employee’s visa could have expired, or they may have sought alternative employment.
“The challenge for employers and lawyers is that the skilled worker earnings data is built into 10 key UKVI rule and guidance documents that need to be reviewed to assess the ‘going rate’ alone.” The Home Office has confirmed that guidance published in July 2024, where salaries have been updated, should take precedence over those shown in the rules, last updated in June.”
The Home Office told each sponsor’s Sponsor Management System: “The Immigration Rules changes in April 2024 contained a number of errors where the going rates stated for occupation codes were too high. Guidance on GOV.UK has been updated with the correct, lower rates and the Immigration Rules will be corrected in the autumn. In advance of the Rules change, sponsors may refer to the going rates in the GOV.UK guidance when issuing Certificates of Sponsorship, as these are the rates caseworkers will assess applications against.”
Beech added: “We want to forewarn all employers employing overseas talent to help fulfil skills shortages not to get caught as these errors are still not widely known.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We were made aware of errors in guidance for sponsors in the Immigration Rules on GOV.UK relating to skilled worker rates of pay.
“This has now been resolved and all sponsors have been notified. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.”
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