ILR after Employer licence issues

[cheeryandhopeful]

Hello All,

I am on a Tier 2 General visa valid until 26 September 2019. I became eligible for ILR in January 2019 on the basis of 5 years on Tier 2 General visa. Unfortunately, my ILR application was refused on the basis that my employer had failed to renew their sponsor licence last year when it expired in July 2018. This was because we no longer have an HR or the knowledge of what needs to be done to manage the sponsorship. I am the only migrant worker they have every sponsored. The sponsor helpline asked my employer to apply for a new sponsor licence as renewal was not possible which they did on 8th February 2019. The new licence arrived on 12 March 2019. It has no CoS allocation at the moment.

In the meantime I have spoken with a few immigration advisers and the response has been mixed in terms of the next steps.

Just to clarify to everyone, I did not know about the expiration of the sponsor licence until my ILR application was refused. The refusal letter said "you do not need to leave the country. You can either make a new application or leave the country before your current leave expires". My employer or I have had no communication from the home office asking me to stop working for my employer. So I have carried on working in this meantime.

I would like some advice on some issues that are confusing me:
1. How would they reinstate my status as a sponsored employee? Now that the licence has arrived do they need to sponsor me again on a Tier 2 General Visa? If yes, how is that possible as I have already been on a Tier 2 General visa for more than 5 years and the maximum term for a Tier 2 General visa is 6 years.
2. If a new Tier 2 general visa is not required then what is the other option?
2. The CoS is 0 at the minute in the licence. The sponsor licence application says they can add CoS using the SMS but need to do so before 6th April 2019 using the SMS account. Do they need to get a CoS and assign one to me again for my ILR like they did at the time of Tier 2?

Thanks

[cheeryandhopeful]

I will really appreciate it if someone could give me some insight. I am sure there are other people who have been in a similar situation as me.

Thanks

[Frontier Mole]

it all depends on wither the Home Office has transferred your previous COS into the new licence. In the circumstances you have outlined it would be appropriate for that to happen.
This is the norm when one company takes over another and it invokes TUPE, so it is entirely possible they have treated it that way although it is the same company but just with different licence numbers,

Suggest you get your employer to verify the transfer.

If there has been no transfer then a new COS and new application would be needed, with all the expense and hassle....

[cheeryandhopeful]

Thank you for the response Frontier Mole.

I asked my employer to call the sponsor helpline and they asked if anything needs to be done to transfer me as an employee from the old licence to the new one. The lady at the helpdesk said if the migrant has not had a curtailment letter and if migrant's leave is still valid then no further action is required from the employer.

I still need to know whether a new CoS needs to be allocated to me.

[Frontier Mole]

The Sponsor Helpine is better than the general helpline but I would still be inclined to get formal verification that you are ok and don’t need to reapply.

Guessing here - but you could test it using ECS - if they give a positive verification all is well. Costs nothing and the company can put the information in the note field to explain the request....