UK sponsor licence FAQs

A UK sponsor licence is Home Office permission for an employer to hire and sponsor overseas workers under routes such as the Skilled Worker and Health and Care Worker visas.

To sponsor workers an organisation must be approved by the Home Office and listed on the official register of licensed sponsors. Holding a licence also brings continuing compliance and reporting duties — sponsors have to report changes such as a worker leaving, and keep prescribed records.

The Home Office republishes the register of licensed sponsors frequently — in practice on most working days. Each edition can add newly approved sponsors and drop organisations whose licence has ended.

This site checks GOV.UK for a new edition every day and records what changed, so each sponsor page shows the date it was first seen on the register and, where it applies, the date it was removed.

Most sponsors hold an A-rated licence, meaning they meet the Home Office's compliance requirements. A B-rating means the sponsor is working through a Home Office action plan to get back to full compliance, and cannot issue certificates of sponsorship to new workers while doing so.

Licences are also issued per route. A Worker licence covers long-term routes such as Skilled Worker, while a Temporary Worker licence covers short-term routes including seasonal, charity, creative and religious workers. Some organisations hold both.

Search for the company by name on this site. Each result opens a page showing whether the organisation is currently on the register, which visa routes its licence covers, the town on the licence, when it first appeared on the register, and — if it has gone — the date it was removed.

If you need to check many employers at once, the bulk CSV checker matches a list of company names against the register in one pass. The register itself remains the authoritative source, so confirm anything decision-critical on GOV.UK.

A sponsor whose licence is revoked can no longer sponsor workers. Workers already sponsored by that employer normally have their visa curtailed and are given 60 days to find a new licensed sponsor or make other arrangements to stay lawfully in the UK.

Revocation usually follows serious or repeated breaches of sponsor duties. GOV.UK does not publish a reason when an organisation leaves the register, so a revoked licence and one the employer simply surrendered look identical in the data — this site reports that an organisation left the register and when, not why.

Yes. Anyone can apply directly to an organisation on the register, and no intermediary is needed. A licence means the employer is permitted to sponsor workers.

It does not mean the employer is currently hiring, that a particular vacancy is open to sponsorship, or that a given role meets the salary and occupation-code requirements of the visa route. Check the advert and ask the employer about sponsorship before applying.

Sponsorship concentrates in sectors with persistent skills shortages. By number of licence holders the largest groups on the register are retail, healthcare and social care, technology, and hospitality and food service, followed by professional services and construction.

Care providers make up a substantial share of all sponsor licences, which is also why care-sector licences account for a large share of removals from the register.

Every licence record comes from the UK Home Office register of licensed sponsors, published on GOV.UK under the Open Government Licence. The register data is not edited — it is re-published here in searchable form, with the date each change was observed.

Company status and ownership-change information comes from Companies House. The site is built and maintained by Borderless Immigration, an OISC-regulated UK immigration provider. Nothing here is legal advice.