Tier 2 salary requirement at lowest since June 2015
The Tier 2 salary requirement for a restricted Certificate of Sponsorship (CoS) is now at its lowest since the June crisis.
October has seen one of the most comprehensive allocations of Tier 2 restricted CoS since the crisis in June. Not only is the number of granted restricted CoS high, but more importantly the minimum salary requirement is low.
Applications needed to score a meagre minimum of 22 points this month and offer a salary of only £22,000 or more in order to be considered for allocation. This is in stark contrast to the minimum salary requirement of £46,000 in June which heavily affected many UK businesses who were simply unable to offer such high salaries due to their size and/or industry.
How has this been achieved and is it sustainable?
Apart from the fact that the season during which the usual number of monthly applications is boosted by a flood of graduate applications has now come to a close, October is the first monthly allocation for which the recently made Home Office changes to the allocation system have been implemented and they seem to be making all the difference.
This is the first month for which the newly altered points table has been used and the increased number of points bands has allowed for greater discernment between salary levels. The Home Office is now able to employ greater flexibility when granting a larger variety of restricted CoS and therefore a greater allocation of restricted CoS has been made possible.
The Home Office has also been granted the power to reclaim any previously allocated restricted CoS which have remained unused for three continuous months since their allocation. This new power is designed to increase the amount of restricted CoS available for allocation each month and has indeed added an extra 456 restricted CoS, almost one third of the original monthly allocation, to the total number of restricted CoS which were allocated this month.
These new changes appear to be going some way towards advancing the reach of the so-called migrant cap, which restricts the amount of skilled migrants allowed to enter the country for work purposes on a monthly basis.
It remains to be seen, however, how far these changes will go to ensure a reliable system in the long run. The significant drop in the minimum salary requirement for October is indeed promising, but it comes at a time in the year when the demand for restricted CoS is low.
Only time will tell whether or not these improvements will indeed be sustainable in reducing the negative effects of the migrant cap on UK business.
Please click here for the new points table.
Tier 2 restricted CoS allocations back on track!
