Before you accept a UK job offer that depends on a work visa, there’s a five-minute check that saves weeks of wasted effort: is the employer actually licensed to sponsor you? An offer letter alone means nothing to the Home Office. Only organisations on the official register of licensed sponsors can issue the Certificate of Sponsorship (CoS) your Skilled Worker visa application needs. Here’s how to check properly, and what the register does and doesn’t tell you.
Where the official register lives
The Home Office publishes the register on GOV.UK as “Register of licensed sponsors: workers,” a downloadable CSV file. It is not a polished search page — it’s raw data, currently running to tens of thousands of rows, updated frequently (in practice, close to daily) as employers gain, lose, or have their licences suspended or restricted. There is no other authoritative source: PDFs, screenshots, or a recruiter’s word are not proof, because the list changes constantly and an employer that was licensed last month may not be today.
To use it directly: download the CSV from GOV.UK, open it in a spreadsheet tool, and filter the “Organisation Name” column for the employer. Several third-party sites offer a simple search box built on the same data if you don’t want to handle the spreadsheet yourself — useful for a quick look, but always cross-check anything that matters against the current GOV.UK file, since mirrored copies can lag.
What the columns actually mean
Three fields matter most once you find the employer:
- Route(s): which visa categories they’re licensed for — most commonly Skilled Worker, but also Global Business Mobility, Scale-up, Temporary Worker sub-routes, and others. An employer licensed only for, say, Intra-Company routes cannot sponsor a standard Skilled Worker application.
- Licence rating — A or B: A-rated sponsors are in good standing and can assign new Certificates of Sponsorship. B-rated sponsors have compliance issues and cannot assign new CoS until they act on an improvement action plan and are restored to A-rating. If a company you’re relying on is B-rated, do not assume a CoS is coming.
- Town/City: useful for confirming you have the right entity when a company name is generic or has multiple UK offices.
What a listing does not guarantee
Being on the register only confirms the organisation currently holds a licence for that route — it says nothing about whether they have sponsorship allocation left, whether your specific role meets the skill and salary thresholds, or whether they intend to actually issue you a CoS. Licences can also be suspended or revoked with little public notice between register updates. Treat the register as a necessary first filter, not a final answer — always confirm directly with the employer’s HR or immigration team that they intend to sponsor your specific role, and verify your own eligibility against the current Skilled Worker salary and skill thresholds before resigning from another job or making travel plans.
If the employer isn’t listed
If a prospective employer isn’t on the register at all, they cannot sponsor a work visa until they apply for and are granted a sponsor licence — a separate process the Home Office can take weeks to months to complete, with no guarantee of approval. Don’t treat “we’re applying for a licence” as equivalent to being licensed; plan your job search and visa timeline around confirmed sponsors only, or ask the employer for a realistic timeline and a backup plan if their licence application is delayed or refused.
Practical steps before you rely on an offer
- Search the current GOV.UK register for the exact legal entity name on your offer letter (not just the trading/brand name).
- Confirm the route matches the visa you need (Skilled Worker, for most standard job offers).
- Confirm the rating is A, not B.
- Ask the employer directly whether they have unused CoS allocation and when they expect to assign yours.
- Re-check the register close to your application date — licences can change between when you accept an offer and when the CoS is actually issued.
This page is general preparation guidance, not legal advice — sponsor licensing rules and the register format can change, so always confirm details on the current GOV.UK register and, for anything borderline, with a regulated immigration adviser. For the full Skilled Worker process once you’ve confirmed a valid sponsor, see our UK Skilled Worker visa guide and cost breakdown. If you’re applying from Kenya, our Kenya-to-UK work route guide covers the corridor-specific detail. Want help tracking your own sponsor-linked application timeline? Join the VisaMet waitlist.