Moving to London and looking for a job..

Hi Sassa

I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but unless you have skills on the shortage list or are currently employed by a company who could transfer you to the UK, or are well educated and have high earning potential, your chance of getting what you are refering to as a work permit is extremely slim.

The options for work-based visas in the UK are as follows:

Tier 1 - allows a person to move to the UK without a job offer already in hand and then look for work.  Major changes have been made to this type of visa and it appears that they will only be granted to entrepreneurs and investors. There is a cap on the number of Tier 1 visas which can be granted each year and applications for this type of visa are currently closed to those outside the UK.

Tier 2 - what is sometimes called a work-permit, but is actually a visa is increasingly difficult becuase a cap has been placed and only 20,700 Tier 2 visas will be granted in 2011 (intra-conmpany transfers or jobs with salaries over £150,000 are not included in this limit). To get a Tier 2 visa, you basically have to prove that you are more qualified for a specific job than anyone else in all of the EU.  So unless you have skills which fall into the shortage list as mentioned above, the employer will have a very hard time convincing the UKBA that they have a geniune need to hire a non-EU worker.  The other thing to keep in mind with a Tier 2 visa is that your right to stay in the UK is tied to your job - if you were to lose your job, you would have to leave the UK.

Heres the UKBA website with much more information: http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/workingintheuk/


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