Switching from Tier 4 to Start-up

The UK Council for International Student Affairs has added a guide to the Start-up scheme to their website, aimed at Tier 4 students:

https://www.ukcisa.org.uk/Information-- ... layer-3796

The issues still to be clarified seem to be:

* The DIT's Sirius programme has not updated their information after the Graduate Entrepreneur scheme closed so it is not yet confirmed whether their participants will be issued a Start-up visa

* Someone with leave under the Tier 4 Doctorate Extension Scheme cannot be endorsed for the Start-up scheme if they have already started a business. Sounds like this could be an error in the immigration rules -- maybe they forgot Tier 4 DES people can be self-employed?

* The DIT's Sirius programme has not updated their information after the Graduate Entrepreneur scheme closed so it is not yet confirmed whether their participants will be issued a Start-up visa

They should be directly contacted for any query

* Someone with leave under the Tier 4 Doctorate Extension Scheme cannot be endorsed for the Start-up scheme if they have already started a business. Sounds like this could be an error in the immigration rules -- maybe they forgot Tier 4 DES people can be self-employed?

There is no such restriction in the rules as far as I see:
W3.4 Restrictions for Tier 4 (General) Students applying in the UK

Zimba wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 08, 2019 2:08 am

There is no such restriction in the rules as far as I see:
W3.4 Restrictions for Tier 4 (General) Students applying in the UK

It's in paragraph W5.1(b)(v)

(b) The applicant must provide an endorsement letter issued by the endorsing body, which includes all of the following information:
...
(v) confirmation that the applicant has not previously established a business in the UK (unless the applicant’s last grant of leave was under the Start-up or Tier 1 (Graduate Entrepreneur) category)

How is that prevent you from being self employed ?? Self employment is not the same as establishing a business.

Zimba wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 08, 2019 3:30 pm

How is that prevent you from being self employed ?? Self employment is not the same as establishing a business.

I think we are at cross-purposes. It is nothing to do with anyone having a prohibition on self-employment.

The problem is that an endorsement letter for someone switching into Start-up scheme must include confirmation that the applicant has not previously established a business in the UK. A Tier 4 DES migrant may have established a business during their DES leave, and may want to continue with it under Start-up. With the rules as they stand, they can't. This may be deliberate, or may be an oversight by the Home Office. It looks like UKCISA is checking with them.

The rules may change to adapt to cover these cases in the future as they may not get everything right at the first instance