Tier 4 to Tier 2

[solarcat]

Hi everyone,

I'm getting very confused about the requirements for a job offer when you have a Tier 4 visa.

Most of the international student guidance pages from universities state that switching from Tier 4 to Tier 2 is easy compared to applying from overseas, because all that is required is that the employer is a registered Tier 2 sponsor, and the job must pay £20,800 a year or more. The applicant is exempt from the RLMT because he or she is already considered part of the labour market.

This makes it sound very easy. However, after digging further I've noticed that there is a prescribed list of what are considered 'graduate' jobs here: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... l_2015.pdf

Obviously, there are many 'graduate' jobs not on this list. This leads me to believe that the job has to be in Table 1 or Table 2 of the above PDF, and it's not as straight forward as finding a job from an eligible employer that pays above the threshold. But then there's talk about restricted and unrestricted Certificates of Sponsorship and then I think I started getting confused.

So...if you're switching from Tier 4 to Tier 2, does the prospective job have to appear in one of those tables, or can it be any job paying over £20,800 providing the employer is licensed? I'm not entirely clear on what the full exemptions are if you're switching from Tier 4.

Thanks!

[ktyagi]

Hi Solarcat,

I am in a similar boat as you. Please keep updating here what you learn outside of the replies on this post. Many thanks!!