In Practice: Retaining Your Tier 4 Highly Trusted Sponsor License

If your organisation holds a Highly Trusted Sponsor (HTS) licence under the Tier 4 scheme, you have been successfully indentified by the UK Border Agency (UKBA) as a sponsor “achieving the highest levels of compliance with…sponsor obligations and whose students are showing the greatest compliance with the terms of their visa or leave”. These words are taken from paragraph 2 of the latest version (06/10) of the UKBA publication Tier 4 of the Points Based System – Highly Trusted Sponsor Guidance. So you understandably want to ensure that you retain and enjoy this licence. This article seeks to highlight just some of the continuing health checks that a HTS, or an A-graded sponsor aspiring to become a HTS, needs to carry-out in order to do just that.

The attraction of a HTS licence is clear: it affords the sponsor with additional freedoms to the standard Tier 4 licences and the offer of new services by the UKBA, such as the provision of a personalised account manager, in recognition of a history of good compliance with its sponsor duties. Indeed, the UKBA make the bold promise to “cut red tape”. But such rewards come at a cost: the HTS sponsor is expected to adhere to the Highly Trusted criteria throughout the duration they hold the licence. If you hold a HTS licence, a visiting officer of the UKBA may, at any time, descend unannounced on your organisation to check whether or not you have maintained the high standards expected of you. They may review you twice in the year following your application for the licence. If the sponsor is found to have failed to show a continued and successful commitment to meeting the criteria, the licence may be downgraded, suspended or withdrawn, along with its rewards. This would leave the sponsor with the very realistic prospect of you having to endure the ‘red tape’ associated with the General Tier 4 licences. In fact, you may even be dispossessed of any Tier 4 licence and hindered from obtaining any future licences, should your internal systems drop to an unacceptable standard.

This article does not seek to address the eligibility requirements to obtain a HTS licence. Instead, it discusses non-exhaustively those measures you need to frequently reconsider should you wish to obtain and keep hold of it.

Strict Adherence

Where the UKBA discover that a HTS is failing to satisfy just one of the eligibility criteria it reserves the right to downgrade, withdraw or refuse renewal of the licence. A HTS must continue to properly assess their overseas students in order to maintain systems to prevent low enrolment, non-enrolment and drop-out rates following enrolment.

Control of your ‘branches’

Your HTS licence may cover your head office and all its branches. Although this is perhaps a neat method of licensing your organisation as a whole, the risk is that where any single branch (or, indeed, the head office) is found to have dropped its standards to below that required of a HTS, it, and all other branches covered  by the single HTS licence may be suspended or withdrawn. Where the branches are individually licensed, however, the other branches will not fall foul of their respective licence requirements if the licence for a single branch is revoked, for example, but the UKBA may still investigate these. It is therefore vital that an organisation implements and strictly enforces robust, uniform organisation-wide systems and processes.

Maintain Accreditation

The sponsor must retain and maintain all accreditation and undergo inspection or audit by a public system of review. Any ‘branch’ that is not a ‘partner’ institution offering pre-sessional courses must satisfy all the Tier 4 sponsor eligibility requirements. For example, it must be fully accredited and subject to a public system of review. Where the partner organisation lacks a HTS licence in its own right, you as the holder of a HTS licence will be deemed to be the sponsor for the pre-sessional courses.

Applications spreadsheet

In addition to the main sponsor duties, you may at any time be asked by the UKBA to supply information to your account manager by way of an ‘applications spreadsheet’ for student details and attendance. The account manager will agree with you in advance the exact details of what they need you to provide in order to allow you to prepare and submit the information on time.

Additional Duties

In addition to the specific duties above, a HTS must:

• Ensure all courses with work placements limit the work placement to less than 50% of the course duration;
• Establish a logical and accessible procedure for Boards/panels approving requests for re-sits by students in exceptional circumstances;
• Ensure that where a student does not enrol, procedures are adhered to. Non-enrolments should be reported to the UKBA within 10 working days and include any reason given by the student for this. Where a student formally withdraws, this should be reported to the UKBA within 10 days.

Worst case scenarios: downgrading, suspension or withdrawal

Where the UKBA downgrade, suspend or withdraw a HTS licence, the sponsor has only 28 calendar days in which to argue its case for reinstatement of its grading. If unsuccessful, the licence may be re-rated or ‘downgraded’ to a Standard licence or, in the worst case scenario, withdrawn altogether. Following this, the sponsor would have to wait a further six months before reapplying for a HTS licence, in which time it will need to show that it has regained processes worthy of the Highly Trusted status. It can in the meantime, however, apply for a standard A (Trusted) licence in the interim.

Renewal of the HTS licence

A practical but important point: all renewal applications for the HTS licence status should be made within good time of the 12 months’ expiry date. If it the application is late, the sponsor has to make a new application for a HTS licence, otherwise the HTS licence is automatically reassessed with a view to granting a standard Tier 4 licence (to run for the remainder of the original Tier 4 licence – should this have also expired, any CAS assigned will be invalidated and existing students’ leave curtailed). The criteria for renewals, assessed in full by the UKBA, are the same as for new applications. The moral of this point: the sponsor’s systems must develop in line with practice advocated by the UKBA so that they are robust at any given time during the validity of the HTS licence.

Conclusion

This article raises just a few of those issues that any HTS needs to keep in the forefront of its mind should it wish to continue enjoying the benefits and reputation of holding a HTS licence. A HTS cannot rest on its laurels; it must constantly revaluate those systems and processes it has in place and adapt these where necessary to remain compliant. Achieving this, however, is by no means a straightforward task. At Mulberry Finch, we offer a wide range of services to assist you in satisfying – and continuing to satisfy – the UKBA’s strict requirements, from one-off advisory services to audits of your internal processes. In a rapidly evolving area of law, we have the up-to-date expertise to keep you up-to-date.