HO UKVI - Migration Business Endorsing Body Services

Tender description

The Home Office is seeking to improve immigration arrangements for entrepreneurial talent from overseas, including further reform of existing visa routes. The service requires Endorsing Bodies to assess the credibility and potential of business and investment proposals and to oversee the successful implementation and delivery of businesses subsequently set up in United Kingdom. Lot 1: The Authority has customers (Visa Applicants) in the UK who include but are not limited to: • those seeking to extend permissions to work or study in the UK; • those seeking to extend permissions to stay or settle with family; • those seeking to evidence their rights as European Economic Area nationals and family members; and • those progressing from earlier immigration permissions to British nationality. The UK Visa & Immigration (UKV&I) service is responsible for making millions of decisions every year about who has the right to visit or stay in the country, with a firm emphasis on national security and a culture of customer satisfaction for people who come here legally. The business endorsement function services the current UK unsponsored business visa programmes covering a number of business/investment routes. To qualify for a visa, applicants must first obtain an endorsement from an approved endorsing body. Endorsement does not guarantee a visa will be issued, but shows the Visa Applicant and their business, has the support of leading business organisations or higher education providers. The Authority may expand the scope of the migration business Endorsing Body services to accommodate future policy decisions in relation to other visa routes to include, but not be limited, to development of the immigration system's offer for business and innovation focused visa routes. The key service requirements are for endorsing bodies to: • Assess and issue endorsements for visa applicants (Customers); • Stay in contact with the Customer, where the Customer has previously been endorsed, at checkpoints after 12 and 24 months, and report on their progress, and in particular alerting the Authority if they are not satisfied with their progress and performance for the duration of their endorsed leave; • Carry out further endorsements and Checkpoint Monitoring where a Visa Applicant applies for a visa extension; • Issue further endorsements in respect of a Customer's settlement application.