The UK Home Office announced significant changes to the UK Immigration Rules which include updates to both Tier 1 Entrepreneur and Tier 1 Investor visa categories.
The new rules come into effect on 29 March 2019.
- The Tier 1 (Graduate Entrepreneur) and Tier 1 (Entrepreneur) categories are being replaced by the new Start-Up and Innovator categories. Applicants will be required to have an endorsement by UK trusted bodies. The investment requirement is much lower in each case, at GBP 50,000 but there could be greater uncertainties when applying.
- Applicants to the Tier 1 Investor visa will have to demonstrate that they have held funds of GBP 2 million for at least a two-year period prior to application, rather than the 90-day period currently in place.
- A clarification is also being made to confirm that “price of the investments” means the price the applicant paid for the investments, not the face value (which does not in itself demonstrate that an applicant has invested GBP 2 million in the UK, as required by the rules).
- The basic requirement stipulating that applicants open a UK bank account before making a Tier 1 Investor application is being tightened to ensure that banks confirm that they have carried out all required due diligence checks and Know Your Customer checks before a visa application is processed.
- Investment in UK government bonds is being excluded to incentivize Tier 1 (Investor) migrants towards other forms of investment which have greater need to attract additional investment funds.