The Scale-up Worker visa route

As the UK continues to grapple with skills gaps within its domestic workforce, the Scale-up visa route opened on 22 August 2022 to enable high-growth businesses in the UK to be more competitive and attract talent for their fast-growing companies from outside the UK.

What is the Scale-up visa?

The Scale-up visa allows foreign workers to come to the UK to work in an eligible role for a fast-growing UK business.

What is a Scale-up business and how is this assessed?

Your business is a Scale-up if:

• it has had an annual average revenue or growth rate of 20% for the previous 3 year period in terms of turnover or staffing
• had at least 10 employees at the start of the three-year period

To assess whether your business meets this definition, the Home Office will access and check your Pay As You Earn (PAYE) information and/or VAT returns you have submitted to HMRC.

How do we employ someone on a Scale-up visa?

As the Scale-up visa route is initially a sponsored immigration route, your business must first have a Scale-up Sponsor Licence from the Home Office, as part of which the above criteria must be met. 

The Scale-up route is not intended to be a long-term solution for employing migrant workers and has been designed specifically to help businesses access a wider pool of talent during a critical stage of their growth. Therefore, unlike a Skilled Worker Sponsor Licence, a Scale-Up Licence cannot be renewed beyond the four-year period it is granted for.

There is no limit to the number of employees you can sponsor under this route provided all of the qualifying criteria are met.

What are the visa requirements for the worker?

Similar to the Skilled Worker visa, Scale-up visa applicants have to meet qualifying criteria.

To qualify, the Scale-up worker must:

• have a Certificate of Sponsorship issued by a Scale-up sponsor, confirming the details of their employment and that they will be employed for at least six months
• have a role that is skilled to degree level
• be paid a gross annual salary of at least £33,000 or the minimum gross salary based on the Home Office’s Occupation Code for the role, whichever is higher

The applicant must be able to support themselves financially and be proficient in English.

How long does the visa last?

Workers on this route are initially granted leave for a period of 2 years, which they can extend by 2 or 3 years, as many times as they like. Workers can apply to settle in the UK after having held leave for 5 years under this route. If granted, they would be allowed to live and work in the UK for an unlimited time without needing to apply for further extensions of leave.

Uniquely, a Scale-up visa holder must only remain employed by their sponsoring employer for the first six months of their visa. After this they can either continue working for you, change or stop working (without needing to notify the Home Office) or become self-employed.

What are the benefits / drawbacks of this visa route?

One of the drawbacks of this route is that the worker is only required to work for your business for six months after which they can leave, which could impact employee retention.

The Scale-up visa is however a “fast-track" immigration route that does not require the same time, cost, and responsibility as sponsoring under the Skilled Worker route. Therefore, In principle, this visa should make it easier for your business to grow its talent pool in line with its own growth to ensure you can attract and retain the highest skilled workers from around the world.

For more information on scale-up visas, please contact our Immigration team.

We also have an area dedicated to providing legal resources & insights to help your scaling business take the next step in its growth. For more information, please visit our