This page explains the scoring system The Home Office use to assess your human resource systems, civil penalties and non-compliance when giving you a licence to sponsor migrants under the points-based system.

When deciding whether you are suitable for a sponsor licence, The Home Office assess you using a scoring system. 

They mark using the following scores:

• 1 - meets all of the criteria.
• 2 - meets only some of the criteria.
• 3 - does not meet any of the criteria.

Home Office score:

1.                  your human resource systems;

2.                  the civil penalties and criminal convictions of your staff;

3.                  any non-compliance by your organisation. 

Scores for civil penalties and criminal convictions

The only scores you can be given for criminal convictions are 1 (no convictions) or 3 (one or more convictions found). If a member of your staff who has access to the sponsorship management system is found to have an unspent criminal conviction for an offence listed in Appendix B of the full policy guidance, you will receive a 3 marking. Any other unspent convictions could also lead to a 3 marking.  

What the scores mean and how they affect your rating

Home Office give an A rating if you receive a 1 score in the three categories and there are no other reasons for giving a B rating or refusing your application. 

The Home Office give a B rating if your organisation receives a 2 score in any of the three categories and there are no other reasons for refusing your application. 

The Home Office are likely to refuse your application if you receive a 3 score in any of the three categories.

It may also be possible for an organisation to get an A rating or B rating if it receives a 1 or 2 for having paid a civil penalty or for non-compliance but receives a 3 for human resource systems. In such cases, the visiting officer may still be able to recommend an A rating or a B rating with an action plan, which will last a maximum of 12 months, with review points every three months.

How Home Office award A and B ratings

When The Home Office give you a licence, they award you an A rating or B rating, rating each application on its own merits. Your rating reflects any track record you have in employing or teaching migrants, and appears on the published register of sponsors.

If The Home Office suspends you, they remove your rating from the register during the suspension period. If the suspension is lifted, they reinstate your name on the register with the rating they award. 

Your rating will usually be the same for all the tiers you are registered for. However, in exceptional cases, if you are performing poorly in your duties in only one tier, they apply the B rating only to that tier. For example, they might do this if a college has adequate procedures in place for managing its migrant workers, but not for overseas students.

A-rated sponsors

If you are an A-rated sponsor, you have no evidence of abuse, and have all the necessary systems in place to meet your duties. 

B-rated sponsors

If you are a B-rated sponsor, a visiting officer has found evidence that the correct systems are not in place or not adequate to meet your duties, or there may be previous evidence of abuse.

The Home Office will award a B rating if:

• you, or another relevant person, have been issued with a penalty for one of the offences listed in Appendix C of the full policy guidance of the policy guidance within the five years ending on the date of application, unless:
• The Home Office withdrew that penalty or it was cancelled on appeal; or
• you or another relevant person has been issued with a maximum civil penalty within the previous six months, in which case they will refuse the application instead; or
• you are an existing sponsor applying to renew your licence and are already B-rated (unless The Home Office are satisfied that you have successfully finished your action plan).

The Home Office may award a B rating if you, or another relevant person, have a conviction for serious offences to do with how you run your business and this makes The Home Office doubt your suitability as a sponsor (such as a conviction under the National Minimum Wage Act or for benefit fraud). The Home Office will not take into account spent convictions under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.  (Convictions may become 'spent' after specified periods of time from the date of conviction if there are no further convictions during that time. Spent convictions are disregarded for certain purposes.)

They consider, among other things, how serious the offence is, the penalty the court imposed and, if the offence was committed by an individual member of staff, any action you took against that person.

They hold you fully responsible for anything done by an employee who appears to act on your behalf. They may withdraw your licence or downgrade it to a B rating if you do not comply with the rules on issuing or allocating certificates.

Downgrading sponsors from an A to a B rating

The Home Office know that most sponsors who employ or teach migrant workers or students are honest and will comply with their duties. However, they have a duty to ensure that they deal appropriately with the minority who do not comply.

The following procedures make sure that The Home Office enforce sponsor duties, identify dishonest or incompetent sponsors quickly, and cancel their licences and punish them. As well as taking enforcement action for sponsorship, they will punish any sponsors that breach the laws on illegal working. Home Office staff are trained and equipped to issue civil penalties and will refer more serious offences for prosecution.

The Home Office will downgrade you from an A rating to a B rating if:

• They issue you with a penalty for an offence listed in Appendix C of the full sponsorship policy guidance, unless they withdraw the penalty or cancel it on appeal - note that they will withdraw your licence if you are issued with a maximum civil penalty; or 
• you have certified that a migrant will not claim state benefits, and that migrant then does claim benefits with your knowledge.

The Home Office may downgrade you from an A rating to a B rating if you, or another relevant person, are convicted of serious offences to do with how you run your business and this makes us doubt your suitability as a sponsor (such as a conviction under the National Minimum Wage Act or for benefit fraud). They will not take into account spent convictions under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. (A convictions may become 'spent' a specified time after the date of conviction, if there have been no further convictions during that time. Spent convictions are disregarded for certain purposes.) In these circumstances, they will take into account, among other things, how serious the offence was, the penalty the court imposed and, if the offence was committed by an individual member of staff, any action you have taken against that person.

The Home Office may also downgrade you from an A rating to B rating if:

• you assign a certificate of sponsorship saying that a job was on the shortage occupation list and it was not; and/or
• any of your level 1 or level 2 users disclose their sponsorship management system password to another person.

Additionally, The Home Office may downgrade an education provider from an A rating to B rating if:

• it continues to sponsor a migrant after they have already failed a re-sit twice or repeated a period of study twice; and/or
• a work placement associated with any of its courses for tier 4 general students accounts for more than 50% of the total course length; and/or
• the study element of any course offered to sponsored students is not undertaken on the provider's own premises; and/or
• it offers courses which are below S or NVQ level 3 (or equivalent), or are below CEFR level A2) for English Language courses, to general students. (This only applies to the migrant's main course of study. Supplementary studies can be at any level.)

B-rated sponsors with sponsorship action plans

A B- rating is a transitional rating. This means that they expect you to have improved your performance enough to be upgraded to an A- rating within a relatively short time. If you do not, you risk having your licence withdrawn.

If you are a B-rated sponsor, you will be set an action plan which you must comply with, within a set time. The plan sets out the steps you need to take to get an A rating. If you do not comply with this plan, it is likely you will have your licence withdrawn.

The plan will be drawn up jointly by The Home Office and you, but they have the final say on its contents and may set an action plan even if you do not agree.

To help you, the plan will explain the steps you must take to become fully compliant with your duties and get an A rating. For example, this might include making specific improvements to your recordkeeping, improving your control over the staff employed to issue certificates of sponsorship or improving communication between different branches of your business so you know when a migrant has not turned up for work. If you do not comply with this plan, it is likely you will have your licence withdrawn.

The action plan will usually cover a period of about three months, but this may be longer or shorter in appropriate circumstances. At the end of this period, they decide whether you should be upgraded to an A rating. If not, they normally withdraw your licence. However, in exceptional circumstances, where significant progress has been made, they may decide to keep you on a B rating and create a further action plan. In deciding whether to create a new action plan, they will take into account all the circumstances, including whether you have:

·         made genuine attempts to meet the requirements of the action plan; and

·         shown that circumstances outside your control prevented you from meeting the requirements.

These are not the only reasons for creating a further action plan and you will need to prove why circumstances justify it.

The maximum period that you can be under an action plan is 12 months. They will review the position every three months. If you are still B-rated after 12 months, you will automatically lose your licence.

If you are a B-rated sponsor, they will inspect you more frequently and extensively.  When deciding what monitoring is necessary, they assess the potential risk you pose to immigration control, like a limit on the number of certificates of sponsorship you may assign.

If you are a B-rated sponsor,  you may have to meet additional duties. For example, they may need you to tell The Home Office when a migrant arrives for work or study, rather than simply telling The Home Office if they do not turn up. They will inform you of any additional duties you must meet.

How to renew or surrender your licence

This section explains how you can renew or surrender your licence to sponsor migrants under the points-based system.

Renewing a licence

A licence will last for four years, which will start from the date:

• the licence was issued; or
• it first became possible to issue certificates of sponsorship under a tier, category, or sub-category to which the licence relates, whichever is the later.

If you have been issued with a licence and later apply for an additional tier, category or sub-category, the expiry date of the original licence will apply to all additional tiers.

If your licence expires at the end of this period and is not renewed, your organisation will lose the right to issue certificates of sponsorship, and will not be able to continue to act as a sponsor. Any remaining leave they have granted to migrants you sponsored will be cancelled (curtailed).

When to apply to renew your licence

You should apply to renew your licence before it expires. They will remind it of the need to renew before the licence expires, but it is your responsibility to renew. They will not accept late applications for renewal, and you will need to re-apply for a licence.

If you have sponsored migrants working for, or studying with you, you will need to renew your licence for as long as you want to keep employing them or having them as students. This applies even if you do not want to sponsor any new migrants.

You must renew your licence every four years to satisfy The Home Office that you are still operating and still want to be a sponsor.  The Home Office will deal with applications for renewal in the same way as they deal with applications for a new licence at the time of the application for renewal. You will not usually need to send the documents you sent with your initial application for a licence. However, you will normally need to provide your previous year's accounts (where relevant) to show that you are still operating lawfully in the United Kingdom. They may ask for other documents.

As long as you apply to renew your licence before it has expired, you will be able to continue acting as a sponsor, for example by assigning certificates of sponsorship and keeping current migrants, until they have made a decision on your renewal application.

Surrendering a licence

If you no longer want to sponsor migrants, and have no sponsored migrants currently working for or studying with you, you may surrender your licence by using the sponsor change of circumstances form, which you can download from the right side of this page

They will then remove your organisation from the register of sponsors, and you may apply for a new licence at any time.

You may choose to surrender your licence in all the tiers, categories and sub-categories you are licensed at the same time or you may choose to surrender part of your licence in certain tiers, categories or sub-categories. You must show which part you are surrendering when sending the sponsor change of circumstances form.

What you must show

You must give evidence that you no longer have responsibility for any migrants that you may have previously sponsored in that tier, category or sub-category. If you have any such migrants when Home Office withdraw your licence, they remove the migrants' permission to stay in the United Kingdom and may remove them from the country.

How Home Office manage sponsors and ratings

This section explains how Home Office manage sponsors and sponsor ratings, including what it means to be downgraded to a B rating, what a sponsorship action plan is, and how The Home Office refuse or withdraw your licence.

A key part of The Home Office’s role is to investigate and to make sure they only award licences to genuine organisations that are likely to comply with their duties.

The Home Office are likely to refer your licence application for extensive checks, which may include an on-site visit by their officers, if The Home Office know very little about your organisation and would like to know more.

The Home Office’s visiting officers will be trained and equipped to issue civil penalties or refer cases for prosecution if they find evidence of wrongdoing or criminal activity. 

The overriding principle

When considering your licence application, Home Office ask three main questions:

• Are you a genuine organisation operating lawfully in the United Kingdom? You must prove this by sending certain documents listed in Appendix A of the full policy guidance of the policy guidance.
• Are you trustworthy? The Home Office look at the history and background of your organisation, your key personnel and the people who control the organisation. Any history of dishonest conduct or immigration crime will be viewed seriously and may mean The Home Office refuse your application.
• Are you capable of carrying out your duties as a sponsor?  They judge this by looking at your organisation's processes and human resource practices (or student attendance monitoring practices in the case of education providers), to ensure that you can carry out your duties. If The Home Office have significant doubts, they may award a B rating or, in more serious cases, refuse your application.