With fines for employing illegal workers set to triple in 2024, Anne Morris of law firm DavidsonMorris shares tips on how not to fall foul of Home Office scrutiny and enforcement action

As the UK care sector continues to suffer labour and skills shortages, hiring from overseas has become business-critical for increasing numbers of care providers. However, employing foreign nationals places onerous compliance obligations on the employer, and penalties for non-compliance are not insignificant.

Immigration compliance duties

UK employers are required by law to meet their obligations under the prevention of illegal working regime, regardless of the size of their workforce or whether they employ foreign nationals. This means ensuring that all workers have the right to work in the UK by carrying out verification checks.

Failure to meet these duties can result in a fine, known as a civil penalty, which the Home Office can issue for every breach identified. In 2024, the maximum fine for illegal working is being increased from £20,000 to £60,000. Fines for a first breach are also being increased, from £15,000 to £45,000.

There is also a separate criminal offence where employers know, or have reasonable cause to believe, they are employing someone illegally.

As well as right to work compliance, care providers with a sponsor licence also have additional sponsorship compliance duties. If the Home Office alleges non-compliance, the organisation’s sponsor licence may be downgraded, suspended or even revoked, directly affecting the ability to employ sponsored workers and potentially resulting in sponsored workers’ visas being curtailed.

How to avoid Home Office fines

Being proactive with immigration compliance is the best approach to avoiding Home Office attention and penalties.

From our experience of working with health and social care employers, we understand this can be challenging in practice. Many care providers operate without dedicated or specialist HR personnel, and immigration may be the responsibility of the care home manager who is already operating with a broad remit.

Common compliance issues we see in the care sector include:

• Failure to carry out right to work checks in the correct manner, or to conduct checks at all.
• Failure to maintain adequate personnel records.
• Failure to ensure the individual presenting for employment is the same person in the identity documentation.
• Breaching sponsorship conditions, such as working hours, salary and location.
• Operating with an expired sponsor licence.

Unfortunately, the Home Office doesn’t accept capability issues as a defence against non-compliance.

With the Home Office placing greater focus and resources on immigration compliance, employers are advised to take their obligations seriously through practical measures such as:

• Mock audits – reviewing the organisation’s immigration-related policies, procedures and documentation to identify and rectify compliance issues.
• Right to work training – online training for all staff involved in the organisation’s recruitment, onboarding and personnel management to understand the rules and their role in ensuring compliance.
• SMS Level 1 and 2 user training – practical training for all sponsorship management system users within the organisation.

DavidsonMorris is an employer solutions law firm with experience of the health and social care sector. For more information about its immigration services, or to discuss how to ensure your organisation is in full compliance with its immigration obligations, contact Anne Morris at: [email protected]

This article is sponsored content.