Frontier Mole wrote:How did you apply for an extension when you could not have had a COS from your employer?
Your immigration status.: that is a good question. There is no certain answer to that without HO confirmation.
When the first PBS licences expired the approach to companies that did not renew was varied. The company would have been contacted and dependent on the respose that would have set off different chaines of action.
My initial thought is that your current sponsor has lasped the licence in favour of the perent company licence. If they just let the licence expire without provision for the tier 2 employees there would be consequences.
You would have expected to have received a curtailment letter BUT it could have been sent to the Sponsor as the PBS system does not necessarily have your home address. However unlikely that sounds it does happen.
If that did happen the curtailment will be on their system but it does not mean it is valid. The rules on deemed service back then would be in your favour.
You could have been totally overlooked and nothing has happened.
Until you have an answer from the HO it is impossible to give you a way forward.. I would not wait for the certain refusal. I would get the parent company to issue a COS and reapply ASP.
The company are at a far greater risk than you. They have continued to employ you when they did not have the right to do so. Assuming they have not transfered the sub company into thr parent company licence.
Thanks for your reply Frontier Mole.
I used the same CoS issued to me for my initial application 3 yrs ago - I wasn't aware that I needed a new CoS for the extension. Silly me! My employer did try to renew the licence but it was done a month late and was refused. The email reminders for the renewal were sent to a staff member (Authorising officer) who had since left the business and these were picked up late. I'm not sure if HO was informed about the takeover. The SMS level 1 user wasn't very familiar with the PBS system and immigration rules and procedures. As you said, it could be possible that my leave was curtailed and the letter was sent to the ex-head office address but then we should still have received it given that we still have some staff members working at the ex-head office (sponsor's registered address). Also, the immigration officer would not have let me back into UK in April this year when I went abroad briefly if my visa had been cancelled?
The parent company is refusing to do so without confirmation from HO about my current immigration status as understandably, they do not wish for their licence to be revoked. I have emailed HO to ask for clarification on this but God knows whether they would reply back and when.
My employer is trying to win back their sponsor status but this would take time and given that I was the only one requiring sponsorship, I doubt they would still go ahead with this due to my current immigration situation.
Any ideas, what I could do?