Skilled Worker Visa: Solicitor vs DIY Application

What the application itself involves

A Skilled Worker application is made online. The GOV.UK guide to the route sets out each requirement, and our requirements guide covers the same ground. In outline you need:

• a job offer from an employer with a sponsor licence, and a certificate of sponsorship, used within 3 months;
• a job at the required skill level, and a salary that meets the figure for that job;
• English at the required level; and
• £1,270 available for 28 days in a row, unless you have been in the UK on a valid visa for at least 12 months or your sponsor certifies your maintenance on the certificate of sponsorship.

Nothing in the rules requires an adviser at any stage. The difference an adviser makes is in the work of assembling and checking, not in what the Home Office asks for.

What goes wrong in applications

Our guide to refusal covers the published refusal grounds in detail. The parts of this route that most often need care are:

• which documents the rules require, and in what form, for this route;
• errors on the certificate of sponsorship, such as the wrong occupation code or a salary that does not match the job;
• working out whether the salary meets the figure that applies, including which parts of a pay package count;
• a previous refusal, overstay or criminal conviction, which the application form asks about and which the rules address separately; and
• the money requirement, where the sponsor has not certified maintenance.

A refused application means the fee is not returned, and later applications ask you to declare the refusal.

What an adviser does

An immigration adviser working on a Skilled Worker case may:

• go through the requirements against your circumstances;
• check the certificate of sponsorship for errors;
• set out which documents the rules require;
• write a covering letter dealing with anything unusual in the case;
• complete the online form on your behalf; and
• handle queries from the Home Office.

Some firms offer a check-only service, where you complete the application and they review it before it is submitted. That is a different scope of work from a full-service package, and normally a different price.

Who is allowed to give immigration advice

Giving immigration advice or immigration services in the UK for payment is regulated under the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999. Doing it while neither qualified nor registered is a criminal offence. A person advising you should be either:

• a solicitor or barrister, regulated by their own professional body — in England and Wales, the Solicitors Regulation Authority or the Bar Standards Board; or
• an immigration adviser registered with the Immigration Advice Authority, at level 1, 2 or 3 depending on the complexity of the work they may take on. The Immigration Advice Authority took over from the Office of the Immigration Services Commissioner on 16 January 2025, so older pages and letters may still use the former name.

You can look someone up on the GOV.UK immigration adviser search. An unregulated person is committing an offence by charging for advice, and there is no regulator to complain to if the work goes wrong.

Questions worth putting to a firm before instructing it:

• Is the fee fixed, or hourly? What is the hourly rate?
• What does it cover — the visa application only, or the sponsor's side as well?
• Who at the firm will do the work, and how are they regulated?
• What is excluded, and what happens if the case is refused?

The employer's side

Employers that sponsor regularly often arrange legal advice themselves, sometimes through a firm they use for all their sponsorship work. There is no rule requiring an employer to pay for a worker's advice.

There is a rule about the other direction. Since 31 December 2024 a sponsor may not pass on to the worker the sponsor licence fee, the administrative costs of holding the licence, or the fee for assigning a certificate of sponsorship. Our guide to sponsor compliance duties covers what else a licence carries.

If the employer is paying, it is worth being clear who the firm acts for. Commonly it acts for the employer on licence and compliance matters and for the worker on the visa application, which means two clients and two sets of instructions.

Questions that separate a simple case from a complicated one

These are the points where the rules stop being a single straightforward test. They are things to find the answer to, whoever prepares the application:

• Has any UK visa been refused before, or has there been an overstay or a criminal conviction? The form asks, and the rules treat these separately.
• Is the salary close to the figure that applies, so the calculation matters?
• Is this a switch from another route inside the UK, where the rules limit which routes can switch?
• Has the employer sponsored anyone before, and does it know its duties?

Our broader guide on using an adviser or applying yourself covers the same question across other routes.

Related guides

• Skilled Worker visa: complete guide
• Skilled Worker visa costs
• Skilled Worker requirements
• Skilled Worker refusal: what to do

Questions and answers