In November 2010 the UK Government announced that it is introducing an annual limit on the number of certificates of sponsorships that can be issued for Tier 2 workers. This came into effect on 6 April 2011 and only 20,700 certificates were made available under the new annual limit.
The annual limit of 20,700 certificates of sponsorship (CoS) were divided in 12 monthly allocations. In April 2011, 4,200 certificate of sponsorship were made available and thereafter a monthly allocation of 1,500 places will be made available. Unused places will be rolled over to the next month.
The UK Border Agency operates the limit by not allowing any sponsor to issue a restricted CoS unless they first get permission using the monthly process. If the monthly allocation is over subscribed, the applications for certificates of sponsorship will be ranked using a points system designed to favour jobs on the shortage occupation list, scientific researchers and higher salaries.
All applications for restricted CoS must score a minimum of 32 points but applications are collate and prioritised, using the CoS allocation points table.
The first monthly allocation took place on 11 April 2011. All valid applications received by 6 April 2011 were successful if they scored at least 32 points. 4,200 Certificates of sponsorship were set aside from annual limit for allocation in April, and 1,019 certificates were granted. The balance of 3,181 Cos was carried over for May 2011.
It is interesting to note that far fewer applications have been received than anticipated.
In May 2011 4,666 Certificates of Sponsorship were thus available, but only 781 granted. There are surprisingly thus 5,365 Certificates of Sponsorships available for allocation in June 2011, and as not nearly this number of allocations is expected a substantial number of Certificates would most probably be carried over to July 2011.
If you are interested in applying, please contact Hannes Breytenbach at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
