Tier 1 Exceptional Talent Application Overview

I have had been digging through numerous questions asked under the Tier - 1 Exceptional Talent category over this forum and so-far very little information is available for those preparing or even thinking of applying under this category. After only partially being successful in gathering feedback about this category, I finally applied based upon material guidance available on the Home Office (HO) website. I am opening this thread for those who are considering on making a Tier - 1 Exceptional Talent "in-country" application. The details of my application and the steps that I took are given below. I will try to update this thread regularly and based upon any feedbacks received from the HO regarding the endorsement or the later stages of my application. Hope it proves helpful to someone:

Summary:

I hold a PhD secured under a fully-funded bursary along with a 21-month post-doctoral experience, an ongoing 2-year industrial job, 17 publications with a cumulative journal impact factor of 4.86 ONLY for the three journal publications from 2013. To-date, I also have one successful and an ongoing PhD supervision. I used two letters-of-recommendation with one from my academic supervisor and one from the Director of a company in Defence and Aerospace sector under whose supervision I am currently working full-time. The job vacancy for the position I am offered (starting from 16/01/2014) is currently available online.

Further details of the application are given below:

Type of Application: Tier - 1 Exceptional Talent (Exceptional Promise route/endorsement only)
Endorsement Request: Made to the Royal Academy of Engineering
Date of Application: 03/12/2013
Confirmation Date (based on the HO letter): 06/12/2013
Academic Field: Artificial Intelligence
Accompanying Letters: Two
Switching From: Tier – 2 General
Processing Time: Despite being directed to the HO website on the confirmation letter, there is no information on processing times available over the HO website.

Experience Brief: Postdoctoral Research Assistantship/Fellowship held for 21 months, currently employed with a British Defence and Aerospace sector company

This is where the application stands as of yet. I shall be posting more details about when I'll receive a response with regards to if my endorsement was successful or not.

APPLICATION STATUS (WEEK 5):
To further update - I made a call on Wednesday, 08/01/2014 to the Home Office to get some feedback regarding the status of my Tier-1 ET endorsement application. The person on-the-line did not have any information about the processing times for the endorsement phase. She did however mention that the actual Tier-1 applications take about 4-weeks.

APPLICATION STATUS (WEEK 12):
Just to further update - this is the 12th week starting tomorrow with no response to-date from the Home Office. In this duration, I had to shell about 1900 GBP for my Tier - 2 General application due to 3 dependents. This duration basically confirms a fact that this route should not be tried as a quicker alternative to Tier-2 even if you have a high-profile job offer or an on-going employment.

FINAL UPDATE - week 44

I was finally awarded a Tier 1 Exceptional Talent endorsement after an 11 month wait. I was contacted in the first week of October by the Exceptional Talent processing team and they adviced me to submit additional information with any updates in my career portfolio. Since my application, I had additional management and software development certifications. Moreover, I also had a few additional publications. Also, the work on the basis of which I had originally applied, led to new funding granted to the company I was already working for over a Tier - 2 General visa. These details were further confirmed by my current manager. The two individuals who originally endorsed me were again contacted for confirmation of their views about my suitability. All this process where I was contacted for the first time by the Home Office till the endorsement, actually took less than a month. Hope this information finally proves useful for someone.

Thank you! It was helpful.

Thank you for this post. I find it refreshing that I'm not the only one waiting to hear news..

It's been 3 months now and I have not heard a single thing from anyone. I've contacted the Arts Council, the home office in Australia and the home office in the UK numerous times, I've written letters to the vIsa offices in Sheffield and no reply.

The visa office in Australia has been most helpful to me with getting my case was passed onto the 'relevant department' who came back by saying I should contact the Arts Council again to get a status update on my application - who of course have not been able to help me and told me to contact the visa people again.

I'll update this again when I hear anything more but just thought I'd post here in case anyone else was having similar problems with this application process...

Very helpful thankyou.If you ever visit this page please drop a PM

Hi,
I am thankful to you for starting this informative tread - its unfortunate that information regarding the Tier 1 ET is very limited. I am optimistic to apply through this route and looking forward if some guidance or template of personal statement.
- By the way how many people in this forum have applied for Tier I ET visa and how many are successful?
- Is there anybody who has applied for Physics?
Best regards,
SM

Something I missed earlier, you have to be atleast a PhD in the relevant field to be considered. Which as we know not allot of people are.

This is not true. I do not own a PhD but was endorsed by Tech City UK for the Tier 1 Exceptional Talent visa. I hold an MSc in a not so relevant field to my endorsement too which is digital marketing.
Just a heads up!

Can anyone advise on what documents should I send to Tech UK other than employment proofs and recommendation letters?