You must provide two recent passport photographs and your passport, along
with proof of the following:
01.That you have invested
£200,000 in to a United Kingdom business:
You must send as many of the specified documents below as necessary to show
the full amount.
Audited accounts
If you are a Director of a registered company that must produce audited
accounts, you should send your company's audited accounts.
These accounts should clearly show the name of the accountant and the date.
Your accountant must be a member of a recognised supervisory body. In the United
Kingdom these are:
- The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW);
- The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Scotland (ICAS);
- The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland (ICAI);
- The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA);
- The Association of Authorised Public Accountants (AAPA).
Unaudited accounts and an accountant's certificate of confirmation
Businesses that do not need to produce audited accounts must send unaudited
accounts, sometimes called management accounts, together with a certificate of
confirmation from a suitably regulated accountant.
Your accountant must be a member of a recognised United Kingdom supervisory
body as listed above, or you will not get points for this document.
Audited accounts, or management accounts accompanied by an accountant's
certificate, must show how much you have invested in the business.
Director's loan
If you have made the money in the form of a director's loan, you must provide
a legal agreement, between you and the company.
This agreement should show:
- The terms of the loan;
- Any interest that is payable;
- The period of the loan; and
- That the loan is unsecured and subordinated in favour of third-party
creditors.
If it is not clear from the information provided that the loan is unsecured
and unsubordinated in favour of third-party creditors, the authority will not
allow you to score points.
02.Evidence of a United
Kingdom business:
If you are in the business person or innovator category
If you have an initial grant of leave made under the business person or
innovator category you may not be able to show us that you have all of the
evidence we ask for from those whose full period of leave was as an
entrepreneur. You may not have a United Kingdom bank account or retained the
evidence that you pay United Kingdom taxes. The authority will not withhold
points from you for this reason if you were previously under the business person
or innovator category.
How to prove a United Kingdom business if your are in the entrepreneur
category
For each business you rely on to claim points, you must supply the
appropriate evidence from the table below to prove that the business that has
benefited from your cash money is a United Kingdom business.
One piece of evidence from the rows in the table should be sent for each
business or company. The required evidence differs depending on whether you are
self-employed or a director of a company.
| (Type of business) |
(If you are self-employed) |
(If you are a director of a company) |
| Business premises in the United Kingdom |
You may not have a business office. If you do
not, the authority will use your registration with HM Revenue & Customs to
show that the business is based in the United Kingdom. |
Print out of a Companies House document showing
the address of the registered office, or head office if it has no registered
office, and your name as a director. |
| Business has a United Kingdom bank account |
a) Personal bank statement showing transactions
for your business; or b) Business bank statement; or
c) Letter from a United Kingdom bank confirming that you have a business
and acts through that bank. |
a) Company bank statement showing that the
company has a United Kingdom bank account ; or b) Letter from a United
Kingdom bank confirming that the company has a bank account.
|
| Business must pay United Kingdom taxes |
You must be registered as self-employed for
National Insurance assessment. Applicants must send one of the following:
a) The welcome letter from HM Revenue & Customs,
b) The small earnings exception certificate;
c) A copy of the quarterly National Insurance bill from HM Revenue &
Customs; or
d) A copy of the your bank account showing that National Insurance is
taken by HM Revenue & Customs by direct debit.
|
Business must be registered for corporation tax
with HM Revenue & Customs. You must send either: a) Your copy of form
CT41G from HM Revenue & Customs.
This must be completed and show the date of registration of the company
and the unique reference number; or
b) A completed HM Revenue & Customs tax return document showing the tax
reference number for the company. This can be either the company short
return form or the company tax return form. If the reporting is done online
you should provide a printout of the form.
|
03.That you registered for
business within three months:
You must provide one or more pieces of evidence from the following list
relevant to your circumstances.
If you are self-employed
You must provide one of the following:
- Original welcome letter from HM Revenue & Customs;
If you register as self-employed, you will have received a welcome letter
from HM Revenue & Customs containing your unique taxpayer reference number. The
original, dated document should be provided.
- Small earnings exemption certificate from HM Revenue & Customs.
If you took advantage of the HM Revenue & Customs small earnings exception,
you will have received a certificate. The original, dated document should be
sent.
HM Revenue & Customs will issue the welcome letter or the small earnings
certificate at any time up to six weeks from the date of first contact with you.
Therefore the authority will accept a letter or certificate that is dated up
to five calendar months from the date when you were previously given permission
to stay in this category (as shown on the documents we sent giving approval of
that permission to stay). For example, if your permission to stay is dated 1 May
2007, the letter or certificate must be dated on or before 30 September 2007.
If you provide documents with a date more than five calendar months from the
date of your previous permission to stay in this category, you will not score
points.
If you are a director of a new or existing company
You must send the current appointment report from Companies House. This will
list the directors of a company and the dates of their appointment.
If the date that you became a director is more than five months after the
date when you were previously given permission to stay in this category (as
shown on the stamp, or vignette, in your passport for those with entry
clearance, or the approval document we sent for those applying from within the
United Kingdom), you will not score points.
If you were given previous permission to stay under the business person
or innovator categories
If you are a business person or innovator, you do not need to show that you
registered within three months. You will score points if you can show that you
are registered when you make you extension application.
04.You are engaged in
business activity:
You must provide one or more pieces of evidence from the following list
relevant to your circumstances.
If you are self-employed
If you are self-employed at the time of applying for the extension, you must
send evidence that you are paying Class 2 National Insurance contributions at
the time of your application. The authority does not need to see evidence of
Class 4 National Insurance contributions if you are paying them.
National Insurance contributions may be paid by quarterly bill or direct
debit, or you may have applied for a small earnings exception certificate.
You must provide one of the following documents relevant to your
circumstances:
- If your National Insurance is paid by quarterly bill, you must send the
bill from the quarter immediately before the application. This must be an
original document and not a copy; or
- If your National Insurance is paid by direct debit, you must send a copy
of the most recent bank statement issued before the application, showing the
direct debit payment of National Insurance to HM Revenue & Customs; or
- If you have very low earnings and have applied for the small earnings
exception, you should send an original small earnings exception certificate
issued by HM Revenue & Customs for the most recent return date.
If you are a director
If you are a director at the time of your application, you must provide a
current appointment report from Companies House. This report will list the
directors of a company and the dates of their appointment.
You must get a printout of the current appointment report from Companies
House (this will mean paying a fee to Companies House). The date of this
document should be within the three months immediately before the date of your
extension application.
This report must show you named in the application is the director of a
business that is actively trading and not struck-off, dissolved or in
liquidation on the date that the printout was produced.
Directors who are on the list of disqualified directors provided by Companies
House will not be awarded points, as they are not able to continue as directors
in the United Kingdom. The authority will check this list before awarding
points. You can see the list of disqualified directors on the Companies House
website which you can find on the right side of this page.
If you were given previous permission to stay under the business person
or innovator categories
If you were given previous permission to stay under the business person or
innovator categories in place before we introduced the entrepreneur category,
you may not be able to provide a printout of the current appointment report at
the time of your application, or may not have kept the evidence that you are
paying Class 2 National Insurance contributions.
If you choose to send evidence of registration but do not have one of the
specified documents when you need to make the application, you must show on the
form that you need more time to get it. The authority will hold the application
open for a period of up to 10 weeks, to allow you time to get and send us the
document separately. At the end of these 10 weeks, if you have still not sent
them this document, the authority will make a decision on your application based
on the information already sent. This is likely to lead to the authority
refusing the application.
05.You created new
employment:
You must provide at least one document from the following.
You may use evidence from your activities as a self-employed entrepreneur, or
as a director, or a combination of evidence from both roles towards evidence of
having created posts.
If you are a business person or innovator
If you are a business person or innovator, you only need to show that you
have created two full time jobs. You do not need to show that the employment
created has been for 30 hours a week or for a continuous 12 months period.
Evidence that the employee is a settled worker
You can only claim points for jobs that are given to people who are settled
in the United Kingdom.
Documents kept by an employer as evidence that an employee is a settled
worker will often be the passport pages that contain the employee's personal
details, and the page containing the United Kingdom Government stamp or
endorsement, if appropriate. It may also be a copy of the worker's birth
certificate.
The number of hours worked by an employee
To score points for any periods of employment created, you must have the
appropriate evidence to support the claim for that employment.
Every employer must register with HM Revenue & Customs and notify HM Revenue
& Customs of the employment, and the earnings of their employees. We are not
able to offer advice on registering as an employer or on the records that an
employer must keep. You can find these on the HM Revenue & Customs website or
through the sponsorship and employers' helpline which you can find on the right
of this page.
HM Revenue & Customs need the employer to keep a record form P11 for at least
three years. This form will show details of the earnings for the employee for
each week that they worked for the employer.
You must send evidence to prove you created two new full-time posts. If your
money resulted in more than two posts being created, you should not send the
extra information.
You must send the following documents for each worker as evidence of the
employment created. (If the business employed workers before you joined it, the
authority will also need the extra documents detailed below):
- A duplicate form P11 signed and dated by you;
- An original form P45 or P46. This must only be submitted in cases where
the P11 does not show the start date for the worker; and
- Duplicate wage documents issued to the worker covering the full period of
employment of the worker.
How to assess hours of work from form P11
The hours claimed for the award of points must be supported by a P11 entry
that you have signed and dated.
Form P11 (as used to report to HM Revenue & Customs) is the employer's record
of the earnings of each separate employee.
These details will remain confidential and will be used to assess your claim
for points.
You can find a copy of the P11 form on the HM Revenue & Customs website which
you can find on the right of this page.
You must supply the hourly rate.
You must provide any changes to the worker's hourly rate and the dates of
this change. This allows the hours worked to be accurately calculated by
dividing the earnings by the hourly rate.
How to assess the dates of the employment from the P11
To claim points, the post must be created as a result of your contribution to
the United Kingdom economy. The posts created by you, or your business, must be
new posts.
If you have joined an existing business, you must have created posts as a
result of your contribution. When awarding points, we will only accept evidence
of posts created after the date that you started work in a business.
Form P11 provides evidence of the dates of employment of the worker. You must
supply a signed and dated duplicate P11 document with the dates of starting
employment.
Form P45 and P46
If the date of the start of the employment is not shown in the P11 form, then
you must send an original form P45 or form P46 for the worker. The worker must
provide these to an employer on starting a job, and they contain the starting
date of the employment.
Pay statements (wage slips)
You must also send duplicate pay statement documents, often known as pay
slips or wage slips, issued to the workers for whom points are being claimed.
These must cover the full period of the employment for which points are being
claimed.
Hourly rate
You must also state the hourly rate for each employee used to claim points.
This will enable us to calculate how many hours of work were created for each
worker.
Assessing the date that you joined the business
For directors of a company the information from the Companies House current
appointment report will be used for two assessments. The authority will check
that you were a director of the company that employed the worker. The authority
will also check that you were a director of the specific employing company at
the time that the settled worker was employed.
If you joined an existing company as a director and wish to claim points for
employment created, you may only submit hours of employment created after you
joined the company.
Companies House will not have records if you are self-employed. In this case
we will cross-check the details of the business with the evidence you provide to
show that it was a United Kingdom business. This will include the dates that you
became self-employed, the names on the P11 and bank account, and the address of
the business.
If you are setting up a new business after you entered the United Kingdom,
the authority will accept that the posts created are additional to jobs
that existed in the United Kingdom before you arrived.
Extra documents the authority requires if you have taken over or
joined an existing business
If you have taken over or joined an existing business or businesses and wish
to show that you have created new posts in these businesses, you must provide
evidence that these posts are a net increase in the employment in the United
Kingdom.
If you have joined a business that employed workers before you joined it, you
must provide extra evidence to support a claim for points for creating jobs in
the business. As well as the evidence specified for the number of hours of work
created, you must show that you created new posts.
You must send:
- A duplicate form P35 document; and
- An original accountant's letter confirming that the new posts have been
created.
Form P35
This is the annual return listing the names of employees of a business.
If this is an online copy of the P35 return to HM Revenue & Customs, the copy
must be signed and dated by you.
You must send the P35 for the year before the jobs were created and the year
that the jobs were created for any businesses used as evidence for the creation
of jobs.
This should show the net increase of two posts. This means that the total
number of employees should have increased by the number of posts that you claim
to have created. If other posts have been lost, points will not be awarded
unless the total number of posts has increased by the number claimed.
To assess the net creation of jobs, we will compare the number of workers
before you joined the business with the number of workers afterwards.
If the posts were created too recently for a P35 to have been produced, a
draft should be supplied, signed and dated by you.
If your previous permission to stay in the United Kingdom was made under one of
the former business person or innovator categories, you do not need to meet this
requirement.
Accountant's letter confirming that the new posts have been created
This should verify that there has been a net creation of jobs, and confirm
the number of posts.
The accountant must be a member of one of the following professional bodies:
- The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW); or
- The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Scotland (ICAS); or
- The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland (ICAI); or
- The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA); or
- The Association of Authorised Public Accountants (AAPA).
The letter must be an original document and contain the following details:
- The name and contact details of the business;
- Your status in the business;
- The number of posts created in the business;
- The dates of the employment created;
- The registration or permission of the accountant to operate in the United
Kingdom;
- The date that the accountant created the letter on your behalf.
The accountant must confirm the content of the letter to us if we ask.
