I was hoping for some advice please as I have found myself in a difficult situation in which my employer has messed up and employed me without transferring my work permit over to my new employment.
I have been living and working in the UK continuously for almost 7 years. I have always had the correct Work Permits to do so.
In December of 2007 I had my most recent Work Permit issued (before Tier 2 applications were brought into effect) for 5 years till 2012 for my (then) current employer.
However, in July of 2008 I was successfully recruited by a large, multi national company but I needed to give 3 months notice at the job I was in. At the time I was recruited, I notified my new employer that I currenty had a WP till 2012 but that they would need to contact the Home Office to transfer my employment over to their company. Even though this was a completely separate company to the one I was previously employed by, the job was identical so I did not invisage their being any problems in a WP being issued for the new job. My new company therefore had at least 3 months to do so before I was no longer employed by my previous company.
I commenced employment with my new company in September 2008, 2 days after completing employment with my previous employer. On my first day of employment with my new employer they took copies of my passport and the work permit (issued to my previous company) but did not provide me with any details about a new work permit for this employment.
A copy of my passport and visa had also been issued to the recruitment company that recruited me for this position on behalf of the company. This was in May of 2008. I always like to make sure that I have copies of approval lettes isued to my employers for my own records, so I asked a member of HR if they could provide me with details of the new work permit. The HR representative said that they would check their records for me and get back to me with the relevant document. At this point, because I was not asked to do anything, I assumed that the company had successfully applied for and transferred over my employment (and WP) to their company.
To cut a long story short, the HR department never provided me with the details of a new work permit approval and I assumed that they had done their job properly and transferred over the work permit from my previous employment over to their company. After much chasing of the HR department, it turns out that they had never processed the paper work that they required to do so to employ me legally, so as a consequence, they terminated my employment (a year after i began working for them) on the grounds that they had been employing me illegally.
When I questioned them as to why they had not obtained the correct documentation before they employed me, I was told that "they didnt think they needed to do anything because I was already living and working in the UK before they recruited me".
I find this extremely frustrating because they had copies of both my passport and current visa BEFORE i commenced employment with them and also because another person who was recruited at the same time as me, who is South African, had a work permit applied for and issued to her on behalf of this company before she started employment. So, the company cannot claim ignorance to the process!
Where does this leave me bearing in mind that this employer in question had copies of my passport and current work permit before I began working for them?
Also, I have a letter of offer from them (previous to me signing my contract) that states my subsequent employment would be subject to relevant checks to establish that I am legally employable in the UK under the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1996). So, I can only assume that once they actually offered me a contract and began employing me that they were satisfied I could be employed legally.
Just before my employment was terminated, I married my British fiance (we received the correct COA) and I have subsequently submitted a spousal visa application. But now I am worried about the success of this application because of the mess my employer has put me in (even though I do not think the Home Office are even aware of the situation due to the fact that they were never notified that I had changed employment). However, because I do not want to lie on any applications, I nominated that I was unemployed on my spouse visa application.
I would really appreciate some advice please. I have always followed the immigration rules and I have made a life for myself here in the UK. I would hate to do the wrong thing and I fear that my spousal visa would be refused and I would be asked to leave the UK. I understand that there is recent legislation outlining that employers are responsible for ensuring that their employees have the correct documentation for legal employment, but what does this mean for me considering that they did not even though they had copies of all of my documents.
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