Right to Work Checks

Key Takeaways

• Every UK employer must check that each worker is allowed to do the job before they start. That includes British citizens, and every worker must be checked in the same way.
• A check carried out as the Home Office prescribes gives you a statutory excuse. That is your defence against a civil penalty of up to £60,000 for each illegal worker.
• There are three prescribed checks: a manual check of original documents, a Home Office online check using a share code, and a check through a registered digital verification service provider.
• If the person has an eVisa, the online share code check is the only check that protects you. A manual check of an expired Biometric Residence Permit never does.
• Where someone cannot prove their right to work in any of those ways, the Employer Checking Service can issue a Positive Verification Notice that protects you for six months.
• Keep the evidence for the whole employment and for two years after it ends, and diarise a follow-up check for anyone whose permission to work has an end date.
• WorkPermitCloud reviews right to work processes, trains the people who carry out checks and audits existing records. See our right to work check service.

Introduction

This page is for employers, HR teams and anyone who hires, onboards or engages people to work in the UK. It explains how to carry out each type of right to work check, what to keep, when to check again, and how to deal with the people whose status does not fit the usual pattern. If you are a worker who needs to prove your own status, our guidance on eVisa and Digital Status is the page for you. If you are facing a civil penalty, start with Illegal Working and Civil Penalties. For help with your own process, see our right to work check service or try the free right to work check tool.

Which Rules Apply to Your Check

A right to work check is judged against the law, code of practice and guidance that were in force on the day you carried it out. A later change in the rules does not undo a check that was done correctly at the time, and it does not rescue one that was done wrongly.

That matters because the rules were revised with effect from 1 October 2026. A check carried out before that date is judged against the version of the code and guidance in force when it was made, which for the period immediately before 1 October 2026 means the code of practice in force from 13 February 2024 and the employer's guide dated 26 June 2025. A check carried out on or after 1 October 2026 is judged against the Immigration (Restrictions on Employment) Order 2007 as amended by the Immigration (Restrictions on Employment and Residential Accommodation) (Prescribed Requirements and Codes of Practice) (Amendment) Regulations 2026, the revised code of practice those Regulations brought into force on the same day, and the employer's guide that accompanies them. The penalty amount, by contrast, is set by the code in force on the date of the breach, which means the most recent evidence of the person working illegally.

Most of what follows is the same under both sets of rules. Where a rule applies only to checks made on or after 1 October 2026, or only to checks made before it, this page says so in the sentence that states the rule.

What a Right to Work Check Is and Why It Matters

A right to work check is the process an employer follows to confirm that a person is not prevented by their immigration status from doing the work in question. The duty comes from sections 15 to 25 of the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006, supported by the Immigration (Restrictions on Employment) Order 2007 and a statutory code of practice. The detail of how to carry out each check is in the Home Office employer's guide to right to work checks.

The law applies across the whole of the UK. The civil penalty arises when you employ someone aged 16 or over who is subject to immigration control and is not allowed to do the work in question, whether because they have no permission, their permission has ended, or a condition of it prevents them doing that job. The check is what gives you a defence when that happens. Licensed sponsors also have a separate sponsor duty to check and keep evidence of the immigration status of every worker they sponsor.

The Statutory Excuse

The statutory excuse is that defence. If you carry out a prescribed check before the person starts work, and carry out any follow-up checks their status requires, you will not have to pay a civil penalty if it later turns out they were working illegally.

Three things follow from how the excuse works:

• Timing is everything. The check must be completed before the employment begins. A check done on the first day of work, or a week later, gives no excuse for the period already worked.
• Only a prescribed check counts. A check that departs from the steps set out for that method, for example by accepting a scan of a document instead of the original, gives no excuse even if the person does in fact have the right to work.
• It must be the right person. Whatever the method, you must take reasonable and proportionate steps at the time of the check to be satisfied that the person whose status you checked is the person who will do the work. Some employers keep a photograph of the person taken at the check for comparison later.
• It does not protect you if you know. You have no excuse if you know the person is not allowed to do the work, if you know a document is false or not theirs, or if it is reasonably apparent that the person in front of you is not the person on the document.

The excuse only protects against the civil penalty. It is no defence to the criminal offence of employing someone you know, or have reasonable cause to believe, is working illegally. The penalties themselves, and how to challenge one, are covered in our guidance on Illegal Working and Civil Penalties.

Who Can Carry Out the Check for You

You can delegate the check to your own staff, including agency workers working under your control. You remain liable if they get it wrong, so the people doing it need training and a written process.

You cannot hand the responsibility to a third party. A check carried out by a recruitment agency, an adviser or any other outside organisation does not give you a statutory excuse. The one exception is a check carried out through a registered digital verification service provider in the way the rules prescribe, which is explained further down this page. An outside organisation can help with the technology, gather information or supply equipment, but the check itself remains yours.

A check carried out for a different purpose does not count either. If a person's status was checked as part of an application for an operating licence or another regulatory approval, that check does not give you an excuse under the right to work rules. You still need your own.

Who You Must Check

Every Worker, Before They Start

Check everyone you are going to employ, before they start, whatever their nationality and however long they have lived in the UK. British and Irish citizens are checked too. The check is not about whether someone seems likely to need permission. It is about proving, for every hire, that they do not.

For employment under a contract of employment or apprenticeship, the civil penalty applies where the employment began on or after 29 February 2008. If someone has worked for you continuously since before that date, you do not need a statutory excuse for them.

Workers, Sub-Contractors and Platforms

Section 48 of the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025 widened the scheme. For engagements beginning on or after 1 October 2026, it also covers people engaged under a worker's contract, individual sub-contractors, and people whose details an online matching service provides to clients or customers. The business in the direct contractual relationship with the worker carries out the check in exactly the way this page describes.

The same changes introduced extended liability, under which a contractor further up a chain of contracts, an online matching service, or an employer whose contracts allow substitution can be treated as the employer of the person actually doing the work. A contractor further up the chain, or an online matching service, does not establish its excuse by carrying out a check itself. It does so by putting prescribed written contractual terms in place before the work starts and maintaining systems that confirm the person doing the work is the person who was checked. An employer whose contracts allow substitution must check the substitute as well as the original worker before the substitute starts. That is covered in full in our guidance on Illegal Working and Civil Penalties, and our posts on right to work checks for gig economy and construction workers and whether you need a right to work check for a self-employed contractor work through common examples.

When No Check Is Needed

The scheme does not reach a person running a genuinely independent business, in their own name or through their own company, who contracts directly with customers. A self-employed plumber you call out to fix a tap is not someone you employ. Nor does it reach a client that contracts with a personal service company for a defined piece of work. Calling someone self-employed does not settle the question, though. What counts is how the arrangement works in practice, and people who find work through a platform or intermediary without running a business of their own can still be in scope.

Agency Workers

Where you take temporary workers from an employment business to work inside your own operation, the employment business is their employer for right to work purposes and is responsible for the check. It is still sensible to confirm in your agreement with the agency that it carries out prescribed checks, and to ask to see evidence.

Checking Without Discriminating

It is unlawful to discriminate on grounds of race or any other protected characteristic when carrying out right to work checks. The code of practice on avoiding unlawful discrimination sets out what that means in practice. In short:

• check every worker the same way, British citizens included
• do not decide who to check from someone's name, accent, appearance, nationality or length of residence. If you check one applicant at a stage of recruitment, check everyone being considered at that stage
• only ask about immigration status where you need it, for example to see whether hours or type of work are restricted
• do not treat an applicant less favourably because their right to work is time-limited, or because they need a manual check or the Employer Checking Service rather than a share code
• do not insist on a particular method of proving right to work, except that someone with an eVisa must be checked online. You must give the person a reasonable opportunity to prove it in any of the prescribed ways available to them

A successful discrimination claim at an Employment Tribunal, or an Industrial Tribunal in Northern Ireland, carries compensation with no upper limit. You are also liable for discrimination by your staff unless you took all reasonable steps to prevent it, such as training and an equality policy. The Equality Advisory Support Service offers free advice on 0808 800 0082, and in Northern Ireland the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland on 028 90 500600.

The Three Ways to Check

There are three prescribed checks. Which one you use depends on the evidence the person holds, not on your preference.

The Employer Checking Service is not a fourth method. It is the route for people who cannot use any of the three, and it has its own section below.

Choosing the Right Check

Start with what the person has. Where someone has been issued with an eVisa, the online check is the only way to get a statutory excuse, so you cannot ask them for a document instead. British citizens cannot get a share code, and most Irish citizens do not have one, so they usually prove their right to work with a passport or one of the other List A documents. A manual check works for any of those documents. A digital provider can verify a British or Irish passport or an Irish passport card, but not a birth certificate or most of the other documents. Irish citizens who hold EU Settlement Scheme status or a frontier worker permit can also be checked online. Where the person could use more than one method, they choose. If they do not want to use a digital provider, you must offer a manual check instead.

Right to Work Share Code Checks

To check a right to work share code, go to the GOV.UK service Check a job applicant's right to work, enter the 9-character code the person has given you and their date of birth, and check the photograph on the result against the person. If the result confirms they can do the work, save a copy of the profile page and keep it. That is the whole of the online check, and for anyone with an eVisa it is the only check that gives you a statutory excuse.

How the Worker Gets a Share Code

The worker generates the code by signing in to their UKVI account through GOV.UK's prove your right to work service and choosing the option to prove their right to work to an employer. A right to work share code:

• is 9 characters long and begins with the letter W
• lasts for 90 calendar days from the day it is generated, and can be used as many times as needed in that period
• can only be used for the purpose it was generated for. Codes beginning with R or S are for other services and cannot be accepted for a right to work check

If a code has expired or was generated for another service, ask the person for a new right to work code. They may give you the code directly, or send it through the service, in which case you will receive an email from right.to.work.service@notifications.service.gov.uk. How workers set up their account and generate a code is explained in our guidance on eVisa and Digital Status.

How to Check a Share Code, Step by Step

1. Get the share code and the person's date of birth.
2. Go to Check a job applicant's right to work: use their share code on GOV.UK. Do not rely on the person showing you their own view of their status, or a printout of it. That is not a check.
3. Enter the share code and the date of birth, and record your business name in full where the service asks for it.
4. Check that the photograph on the result is of the person who will be doing the work. You can do this in person or by video call. For checks carried out on or after 1 October 2026, you can also do it with facial recognition technology, but only through a registered digital verification service provider.
5. Read the result. Confirm that the person is allowed to work, that any restriction on the type of work or the number of hours fits the job you are offering, and note any date on which their permission ends.
6. Save a copy of the profile page as a PDF or HTML file, or print it. The profile page shows the photograph and the date of the check.
7. If the permission is time-limited, diarise a follow-up check for before the end date.

Everything in steps 1 to 6 must be finished before the person starts work.

What the Result Shows

The result shows one of three things: a continuous right to work, a time-limited right to work with no restrictions, or a time-limited right to work with restrictions, such as a limit on weekly hours or on the type of work. A continuous result gives you an excuse for the whole of the employment. A time-limited result gives you an excuse until the date shown, and you must check again before then.

If the result shows a restriction, the job you offer must fit inside it. A student with a 20-hour term-time limit cannot be rostered for 25 hours, and a person whose permission restricts them to certain occupations can only be employed in one of them. Employing someone in breach of a condition is illegal working, even though they have permission to be in the UK.

What to Keep

Keep the saved profile page securely for the whole of the employment and for two years after it ends, then destroy it securely. If you used facial recognition through a provider to match the photograph, keep the comparison alongside the profile page for the same period. Be ready to produce these records quickly if the Home Office asks. If you cannot show how and when you checked, you cannot show that you have an excuse.

When the Online Service Does Not Work

• The name or photograph is wrong. If the name on the result does not match the name the person uses, or the photograph is missing, out of date or of poor quality, the person must update the details in their UKVI account.
• The service produces the wrong result or no code at all. Where a technical fault produces an incorrect share code or result, or the person temporarily cannot generate a code, you can ask the Employer Checking Service to verify their right to work instead.
• The person has applied to extend their stay. Someone who made an in-time application to extend their permission can normally still generate a share code, and the online check will give you a six-month excuse. If they cannot generate one, use the Employer Checking Service.
• You or the worker need help with the service. The UKVI Resolution Centre on 0300 790 6268 deals with problems accessing or using the online status services.

Manual Document Checks

A manual check means examining the person's original documents yourself. It is how most British and Irish citizens prove their right to work, and it is the fallback for anyone who holds an acceptable document but no digital status. GOV.UK's check a job applicant's right to work page summarises it, the Home Office publishes an employer's right to work checklist you can work through each time, and the interactive tool check if someone can work in the UK tells you which documents apply.

Obtain, Check, Copy, Record

A manual check has four stages, and all four must be finished before the person starts work.

1. Obtain original documents from List A or List B below. A photocopy, a scan or a photograph on a phone is not an original.
2. Check the documents while the person is present. Confirm each document is genuine, has not been tampered with and belongs to the person presenting it. Make sure the photographs and dates of birth are consistent across the documents and with the person's appearance. Check that any permission to be in the UK has not expired, and that any restriction on the type of work or the hours allowed fits the job.
3. Copy each document clearly, in a format that cannot later be altered, electronically or on paper. For a passport, copy every page showing the expiry date, nationality, date of birth, signature, photograph and biometric details, and any page with a visa, entry stamp or endorsement showing permission to be in the UK and to do the work. The front cover does not need copying. For any other document, copy the whole of it, including both sides of an Immigration Status Document or an Application Registration Card.
4. Record the date of the check and keep the copies securely for the whole of the employment and for two years after it ends, then destroy them securely.

If names differ between documents, ask for evidence that explains the difference, such as a marriage certificate, a decree absolute or a deed poll, and keep a copy of it with the check.

Checking by Live Video

You do not have to meet the person face to face. A manual check can be done over a live video link, as long as you have the original documents physically in your possession while you do it. In practice that means the person posts their documents to you and then joins a video call so you can compare them with the person on screen. Looking at a document held up to a camera, or at a scan or photograph of it, is not a manual check and gives no excuse.

Dating the Copy Properly

Writing a date on the copy is not enough, because it does not show that the date is when the check was done. Either add a dated declaration to the copy in these words, "The date on which this right to work check was made: [date]", or keep a separate manual or digital record, made at the time of the check, that records the date alongside the copies.

National Insurance Number Evidence in Digital Form

Several List A documents are acceptable only together with official evidence of the person's permanent National Insurance number and name. For checks carried out on or after 1 October 2026, that evidence may be a digital version issued by or on behalf of a government agency, for example a screenshot on the person's phone or an email, as long as you are confident it is genuine and belongs to them. Never ask for the password to the person's account or device. For checks carried out before 1 October 2026, the evidence had to be an original document.

List A and List B Documents

List A documents show a continuous right to work. A correct check of a List A document gives you a statutory excuse for the whole of the employment, with no follow-up check needed.

List B documents show a time-limited right to work. They are split into two groups, because the excuse they give lasts for different periods.

Documents You Must Not Accept

• An expired Biometric Residence Permit or Biometric Residence Card. BRPs stopped being issued on 31 October 2024 and every one has expired. A manual check of one is not proof of right to work. The holder has an eVisa, and you must check it online.
• A clipped passport. A passport with the corners of its pages cut off has been cancelled and is not acceptable, even for a British or Irish citizen.
• Copies of any kind. Scans, photocopies, photographs and documents shown over video without being in your hands, with the single exception of digital National Insurance number evidence described above.
• An EEA national passport or identity card on its own. Since 1 July 2021 these only prove nationality. An EEA citizen proves their right to work through their EU Settlement Scheme status or other immigration permission.
• Letters and decision notices. A Home Office acknowledgement letter, a solicitor's letter, a court judgment or a decision letter granting permission does not give you a statutory excuse. The person's status must be checked by one of the prescribed methods.

Spotting False Documents

You are not expected to be a forensic document examiner. If you are given a false document, you are only liable if its falseness was reasonably apparent, meaning that someone untrained could reasonably have spotted it on a careful but brief inspection without specialist equipment. The same test applies where the photograph on a genuine document, or on an online check, plainly is not the person in front of you.

The Home Office's guidance on examining identity documents, and the PRADO and EdisonTD archives of genuine document images, help you know what a real document should look like. The Home Office also runs low-cost online courses on right to work checks and on document fraud awareness. If you are given a false document, or a genuine document that does not belong to the person, report it to the Home Office. If you have doubts about someone's identity or documents, raise them with the person sensitively and give them the chance to explain before drawing conclusions.

Digital Checks Through a Verification Provider

Instead of examining a passport yourself, you can use a digital verification service provider to verify the document and the person's identity remotely. This is optional. It is useful for remote hiring and high-volume recruitment, and it gives you the same statutory excuse as a manual check, provided both you and the provider follow the prescribed steps.

The rules call these providers right to work digital verification service providers, or RtW DVSPs. Older guidance and many providers' own websites still use the earlier terms identity service provider (IDSP) and identity document validation technology (IDVT).

What a Provider Can Check

For checks carried out on or after 1 October 2026, a registered provider can verify:

• a British passport, or an Irish passport or passport card, that is current or has expired by not more than six months. Expired documents are verified by reading the chip, a process called passive authentication, so a provider cannot verify one with a damaged chip, and some providers choose not to offer checks on expired documents at all
• digital versions of documents from List A or List B supplied to the provider by a government department or agency. The Home Office has said that in practice this will at first be limited to official evidence of a person's National Insurance number and name
• the person's face against the photograph on a document or an online check, using facial recognition technology

For checks carried out before 1 October 2026, a provider could only verify a current British or Irish passport or Irish passport card.

A provider cannot replace the online check for someone with an eVisa. That person's status must be checked with a share code. A provider can, however, carry out the facial recognition step on the result.

Choosing a Provider

For checks carried out on or after 1 October 2026, the provider must be registered on the government's digital verification services register with a note that it provides right to work checks, and you must obtain confirmation from it that it is registered and that the services it is providing for your check meet the supplementary code for digital right to work checks. If you buy a provider's service through another organisation, such as a screening or referencing agency, that organisation must tell you which registered provider is carrying out the check.

Using a provider does not move the responsibility. If the check was not carried out as prescribed, you have no excuse, whoever made the mistake.

Facial Recognition

For checks carried out on or after 1 October 2026, you can use facial recognition technology to confirm that the person doing the work is the person on the document or the online check, for any of the three types of check. If you rely on facial recognition for that purpose, it must be provided by a registered RtW DVSP. You must obtain copies of both facial images in a format that cannot be altered, and the provider's confirmation that they show the rightful holder, and keep them for at least two years after the employment ends.

Facial recognition is never compulsory. If the technology cannot match someone, or they do not want to use it, you must give them another way to prove their identity, for example checking the photograph in person or by video.

What You Must Still Do Yourself

• check that the photograph and details the provider returns are of the person who will be doing the work, in person, by video, or through the provider's facial recognition
• confirm the result shows the person is allowed to do the work
• keep a clear copy of the provider's output, including the image of the document and the confirmation that the identity was verified, for the whole employment and two years after
• offer a manual check to anyone who does not want to use a provider, and treat them no less favourably for choosing it

The Employer Checking Service

The Employer Checking Service, usually called the ECS, is how you ask the Home Office to confirm someone's right to work when they cannot prove it through a share code or an acceptable document. It is a fallback, not an alternative you can choose for convenience. If the ECS confirms the person can do the work, it issues a Positive Verification Notice, and that notice is your statutory excuse.

When You Must Use It

You need a Positive Verification Notice from the ECS to have an excuse in each of these situations:

1. the person gives you a non-digital Certificate of Application, or an acknowledgement letter or email, for an EU Settlement Scheme application made on or before 30 June 2021
2. the person gives you a non-digital Certificate of Application for an EU Settlement Scheme application made on or after 1 July 2021
3. the person gives you an Application Registration Card stating that they are permitted to do the work in question, in date if the card shows an expiry date
4. the person is not a British or Irish citizen, has given you no acceptable document, and you cannot use the online service, for example because of a technical problem with their eVisa
5. the person has given you no acceptable document and cannot generate a share code because they have an application, administrative review or appeal outstanding with the Home Office that was made before their previous permission expired
6. the person has given you no acceptable document because their status is one the Home Office must verify directly, such as permission issued in Jersey, Guernsey or the Isle of Man
7. the person has given you no acceptable document but has other information showing they are a long-term resident who arrived in the UK before 1988

Use the online ECS tool on GOV.UK. It first asks questions to confirm whether you need a verification check at all, then takes the details. You will need the person's full name, date of birth, nationality, job title, weekly hours and UK address, and their Home Office reference number if they have one. Tell the person you are making the check. Where they have an application, review or appeal pending, ask them when it was made. The ECS may also ask you for copies of any documents you have seen.

The Positive Verification Notice

The ECS aims to respond within five working days of a valid request. Working days here exclude weekends, Christmas Day, Good Friday and bank holidays in England.

• A Positive Verification Notice confirms the named person may do the type of work in question. It gives you a statutory excuse for six months from the date stated in the notice. If you want to keep employing them after that, you must carry out a further check before the six months end.
• A Negative Verification Notice means the ECS has not confirmed a right to work. If you employ the person, or continue to, you have no excuse and may also be committing a criminal offence.

Do not use the ECS for someone who has worked for you continuously since before 29 February 2008. That employment is outside the civil penalty scheme, so the ECS will return a Negative Verification Notice, and the notice does not mean the person lacks permission to work.

The ECS confirms the position on the day it checks. If you later learn that a worker has lost their right to work and you keep employing them, the notice will not protect you.

Asylum Seekers and Application Registration Cards

An Application Registration Card, or ARC, is issued to people who have claimed asylum. Asylum seekers cannot normally work. They can apply for permission to work if their claim has been waiting for an initial decision for more than 12 months through no fault of their own, and the same applies to people whose protection-based further submissions have been outstanding for that long. Our post can ARC card holders work? walks through the process in detail.

If permission is granted, it is restricted to particular jobs, and which jobs depends on when the permission to work application was made. Under the Immigration Rules as changed by the statement of changes HC 1691:

The Home Office's permission to work guidance places responsibility on the applicant and the prospective employer to make sure the job is on the relevant list, meets the salary threshold and that the person is qualified for it. Under paragraph 360A of the Rules, self-employment is not permitted. Permission granted on an application made before 4 April 2024 was restricted to the shortage occupation list, and those ARCs say "work permitted shortage OCC". The code of practice and the employer's guide give the cut-off for the Immigration Salary List as 24 March 2026, but the Immigration Rules, which decide what work is permitted, use 26 March 2026. Whichever applies, the Positive Verification Notice confirms the work the individual may do, so rely on it rather than on the date.

To employ an ARC holder:

• see the original ARC. Both the older design and the biometric design issued since 2017 are acceptable until they expire
• make sure the job falls within the restriction that applies to them
• obtain a Positive Verification Notice from the ECS before they start. The notice, not the card, gives you the excuse
• carry out a follow-up check through the ECS before the six months end

Permission to work ends if the asylum claim is refused and any appeal rights are exhausted. Asylum seekers without permission to work may still volunteer, but they may not do voluntary work, which is explained further down this page. Anyone granted refugee status or humanitarian protection has an unrestricted right to work and proves it through the online service or, for some older grants, an Immigration Status Document checked manually.

Windrush and Long-Term Residents

Some people who have lived lawfully in the UK since before 1988, including members of the Windrush generation who arrived before 1973, have no document from the lists to prove it. Do not turn them away. Contact the ECS, which passes the case to the Windrush Help Team. The team contacts the person to confirm their circumstances and help them get their status recognised. Individuals can also call the team directly on 0800 678 1925.

Follow-Up Checks

When a Follow-Up Check Is Needed, and When It Is Not

If the first check showed a time-limited right to work, you must check again on or before the date the permission ends if you want to keep employing the person. The follow-up does not have to use the same method as the first check.

No follow-up check is needed where the first check was a List A document, or showed indefinite leave or settled status, or showed status under the EU Settlement Scheme. That includes pre-settled status. A correct check before the employment starts is all that is required for EU Settlement Scheme status holders, and the Home Office will not take civil penalty action provided you are not knowingly employing someone without the right to work.

Where the excuse came from a Positive Verification Notice, the follow-up is due before the six months end.

Pending Applications, Appeals and 3C Leave

A person who applies to extend or vary their permission before it expires keeps their existing permission, and its conditions, while the application is decided and while any administrative review or appeal is pending. This is known as 3C leave, after section 3C of the Immigration Act 1971.

• if the person has an eVisa, carry out an online check. It will confirm their right to work and give you a six-month excuse, after which you check again
• if they cannot give you a share code, contact the ECS
• for an administrative review of a decision made in the UK, the application must be made within 14 calendar days of the decision. Any existing permission to work continues during that time and while the review is decided, normally within 28 calendar days

The 28 Day Grace Period

If your earlier check was a manual check or an online check and, on the date your excuse is due to expire, you are reasonably satisfied that the worker has an in-time application, appeal or administrative review pending, or is a long-term resident who arrived before 1988 and cannot provide documents, your excuse continues for up to 28 calendar days from the date their permission expired. Use that time to get a Positive Verification Notice from the ECS or carry out an online check.

• the grace period only applies to follow-up checks. It never applies to a check before someone starts work. If you cannot complete a prescribed check before the start date, delay the start date
• it ends early if the ECS issues a Negative Verification Notice
• the application or appeal must have been made on or before the date the permission expired
• a Home Office acknowledgement, a reference number or proof of posting can help satisfy you that an application has been made, and it is worth keeping a copy, but none of them is an excuse in itself

If a Follow-Up Check Shows No Right to Work

A worker who cannot show you their status on the day may still have it. They may be covered by 3C leave, or a technical fault may have produced a wrong result or stopped them generating a code. Give them a reasonable opportunity to prove their right to work, and use the ECS where it applies.

If the position is confirmed and they do not have the right to work, you lose your excuse from the moment you know and continue the employment. Take steps to end it, and report the situation to the Home Office on the Employer Enquiry helpline, 0300 790 6268, asking for a Unique Reference Number. Where permission is later granted, you only regain an excuse by carrying out a fresh prescribed check. A solicitor's letter or a court judgment saying the case was won does not do it.

A reliable reminder system is what stops follow-up checks being missed. Our UKVI compliant HR software tracks expiry dates and prompts follow-up checks, and the free right to work check tool helps you work out which check applies.

EEA, Swiss and Irish Citizens

Free movement ended on 31 December 2020. EEA and Swiss citizens now prove their right to work in the same way as anyone else, through their immigration status, and an EEA passport or national identity card on its own is not enough. Those who arrived after 31 December 2020 without EU Settlement Scheme status need immigration permission like any other non-British worker, and you will usually need a sponsor licence to employ them from overseas.

There is no requirement to carry out retrospective checks on EEA citizens you employed before 1 July 2021. You keep your excuse if the original check followed the rules in force at the time. If you choose to recheck existing staff, do it consistently and in line with the discrimination code, never only for the people you assume are European.

Irish Citizens

Irish citizens have an unrestricted right to work. They can prove it with an Irish passport or passport card, current or expired, through a manual check or a digital provider. Some also hold EU Settlement Scheme status or a frontier worker permit, which you check online.

EU Settlement Scheme Status

People with settled or pre-settled status prove their right to work through the online service. Check them before they start. No repeat check is needed afterwards.

Pending EU Settlement Scheme Applications

EEA citizens and their family members who have made a valid application to the scheme have a right to work until it is finally decided, including any administrative review or appeal. Do not treat them less favourably. A digital Certificate of Application lets the person generate a share code, so you check them online and do not need the ECS. A non-digital certificate, or an acknowledgement of an application made on or before 30 June 2021, needs a Positive Verification Notice from the ECS.

A family member arriving on an EU Settlement Scheme family permit can work while the permit is valid, which is six months, and should generally apply to the scheme within three months of arriving or before the permit expires, whichever is later.

Frontier Workers

Frontier workers are EEA citizens who live outside the UK and have a right to come here to work. If they have a digital frontier worker permit, check it online in the usual way. If they cannot give you a share code or have only non-digital evidence, ask the ECS.

Status Granted in Jersey, Guernsey or the Isle of Man

The Crown Dependencies run their own equivalents of the EU Settlement Scheme, and the UK recognises status granted under them. The person will have a letter or email confirming their status or application. Request an ECS check, and keep both the letter or email and the ECS response.

EEA Citizens With Indefinite Leave but No Scheme Status

Some EEA citizens were granted indefinite leave long ago and never applied to the scheme. Check them manually using an acceptable document from List A. If they have no document, point them towards the Windrush Scheme, an application to the EU Settlement Scheme if they have reasonable grounds for applying late, or a no time limit application, as appropriate. Citizens of Malta or Cyprus may also be able to apply for British citizenship through the Windrush Scheme.

Checking Workers With Restrictions

Some people have permission to work but only within limits. Your check has to confirm the job fits those limits, and for some groups you need extra evidence beyond the check itself. The rules on what each group may do sit on other guidance pages. This section covers what you, as the employer, have to check and keep.

Students

Most international students have an eVisa, and the online check shows whether they can work and how many hours a week are allowed in term time. Some older permissions are shown by an endorsement in the passport instead. If neither says the student may work, they cannot work at all, other than a work placement that is an integral and assessed part of their course.

For a student whose permission limits their hours in term time, you must also:

• obtain, copy and keep the dates of their academic terms and vacations for the whole period you will employ them, whichever type of check you used
• get those dates from the education provider, either directly or through a letter or email the student has received from the provider. If the dates differ from what the provider publishes elsewhere, ask for clarification
• roster them within the weekly limit during term time. A week runs from Monday to Sunday. Terms can end on any day of the week, and full-time work is allowed from the day after the term ends

Students with permission to work may work full-time before their course starts, during vacations, and after their course has ended. They may not fill a permanent full-time vacancy, unless they are a Student Union Sabbatical Officer, or they have made a valid application to switch to the Skilled Worker route and are within three months of their course end date, or they have made a valid Graduate route application after successfully completing their course. They may not be self-employed, apart from a narrow exception for a pending endorsed Innovator Founder application, and may not work as an entertainer or professional sportsperson.

For a work placement, ask the student's education provider for a letter confirming that the placement is an integral and assessed part of the course, and setting out its terms, the work involved and how it will be assessed. Keep it. Placement hours do not count against the term-time limit. Voluntary work, on the other hand, does count against it.

If a student stops studying or their sponsor loses its licence, the Home Office may curtail their permission, either with immediate effect or from 60 days after the student is notified. Their right to work ends when the curtailed permission ends. A student who still holds Tier 4 permission has the same work rights as one with Student permission. If they make an in-time application to vary their permission, their existing conditions continue while it is decided.

The hour limits themselves, and how they depend on the sponsor and the level of the course, are explained in our guidance on Graduate and Student Switching.

Skilled Workers Taking a Second Job

A sponsored Skilled Worker can take supplementary employment with another employer, within limits. If you are that second employer, your check must confirm the job fits those limits as well as confirming their right to work. The work must:

• be no more than 20 hours a week in total, across every supplementary job they have
• fall outside their contracted hours for their sponsor
• be in the same profession and at the same professional level as their sponsored job, or in an occupation that the rules allow for supplementary work, which depends on when the worker was first granted Skilled Worker permission

The online check will not show you these details, so ask the worker for a letter or other evidence from their sponsor confirming that they still work for the sponsor and what their contracted hours are, and, where you need it to decide whether the occupation qualifies, the job description and occupation code of the sponsored job. If you later have reason to think they have stopped working for the sponsor or their hours have changed, ask again. Workers on several other sponsored routes, including T2 Minister of Religion, International Sportsperson, Creative Worker, Religious Worker, International Agreement, Government Authorised Exchange and some Global Business Mobility Senior or Specialist Workers, are more restricted: supplementary work must be on the Immigration Salary List or in the same profession and at the same level as their sponsored job.

Which occupations qualify, and what happens to the second job if the main one ends, are covered in our guidance on Skilled Worker: Job Loss and Second Jobs, in our post on whether Skilled Workers can take an additional job, and in the free supplementary work check tool.

Volunteers and Voluntary Workers

A volunteer gives their time freely, with no contract, no obligation to work and no payment beyond limited expenses. A voluntary worker has a contract, even an unwritten one, to perform work personally, but receives no pay beyond expenses and reasonable subsistence or accommodation, and works for a charity, a voluntary organisation, an associated fundraising body or a statutory body. The difference matters because a voluntary worker needs permission to work, and someone working for any other kind of organisation, or receiving any other payment or benefit, needs permission to work even if unpaid.

Visitors may volunteer for a registered charity for up to 30 days, as long as volunteering is not the main purpose of their visit, but they may not do voluntary work. Asylum seekers may volunteer without permission to work. Students with permission to work may do voluntary work, but it counts towards their weekly limit. If you are not sure which side of the line an arrangement falls on, take advice before the person starts.

Business Changes: TUPE and Changes of Legal Form

TUPE Transfers and the 60 Day Grace Period

When you acquire staff through a transfer under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006, the previous employer's checks are treated as yours. You inherit their statutory excuse, but you also inherit their mistakes. If they did not check a worker correctly, and that worker started on or after 29 February 2008, you are liable if the worker turns out to be working illegally.

For that reason the Home Office advises a fresh check on every transferring worker, and allows 60 calendar days from the date of the relevant transfer to do it. The 60 days apply even where the transferring business is in terminal insolvency proceedings such as compulsory liquidation. There is no grace period for later follow-up checks, and a fresh check is often the only way to find out when a follow-up is due.

When You Do Not Need to Check Again

A new check is not needed where the employer remains the same legal entity and only its legal form changes, for example from a private limited company to a public limited company, or from a partnership to a limited company, or where there is a TUPE transfer between companies in the same group. If there is any doubt, the Home Office recommends carrying out a check.

Record Keeping and Common Mistakes

What to Keep and for How Long

Keep every record securely for the whole of the employment and for two years after it ends, then destroy it securely. Keep follow-up check records in exactly the same way as the initial check.

Right to Work Checks for Sponsored Workers

If you hold a sponsor licence, checking and keeping evidence of every sponsored worker's immigration status is also a sponsor duty, and it applies whether or not the arrangement falls within the right to work scheme. A missing or defective check can therefore cost you your licence as well as a penalty. The wider record-keeping duties are covered in our guidance on Sponsor Licence: Compliance and Duties, and our free HR compliance audit will show you where your records stand.

The Mistakes That Cost Employers Their Excuse

• checking on or after the first day of work instead of before it
• accepting an expired BRP, a scan, a photocopy or a document shown over video without having the original
• writing a date on the copy instead of recording the date of the check properly
• looking at the worker's own view of their status instead of running the check with the share code
• accepting a birth certificate or naturalisation certificate without the National Insurance number evidence that must accompany it
• missing a follow-up check, or carrying one out after the permission has already ended
• using a digital provider for someone with an eVisa, or a provider that is not registered to provide right to work checks
• letting a recruitment agency or other third party carry out the check and relying on it
• rostering a student or a second-job worker beyond the hours they are allowed
• checking only the people who seem to be from overseas

What Happens If You Get It Wrong

Employing someone who is not allowed to do the work, without a statutory excuse, can lead to a civil penalty of up to £45,000 per worker for a first breach and £60,000 per worker for a repeat breach within three years. Employing someone you know, or have reasonable cause to believe, is working illegally is a criminal offence carrying up to five years in prison and an unlimited fine. Other consequences can include closure of the business, director disqualification, seizure of earnings made from illegal working, publication in the Home Office list of employers who have received penalties, the loss of a sponsor licence and the loss of licences in the alcohol, late night refreshment, taxi and private hire sectors. How penalties are calculated, reduced and challenged is explained in our guidance on Illegal Working and Civil Penalties, and on GOV.UK's penalties for employing illegal workers page. If you have received a notice, our civil penalty service can help.

Detailed Guides on This Topic

• Employer Checking Service: can ARC card holders work? How to verify an asylum seeker's permission to work through the ECS.
• Can Skilled Worker visa holders take an additional job in the UK? The supplementary employment rules from the worker's side.
• New right to work checks for gig economy and construction workers. How the scheme reaches platforms, sub-contractors and substitution arrangements.
• Do you need a right to work check for a self-employed contractor? Where the line falls between a worker and an independent business.

How Can WorkPermitCloud Help?

Most right to work failures are not deliberate. They come from a process that was set up once and never revisited: a manager checking a BRP because that is what the checklist still says, a date written on a copy instead of recorded properly, a student rostered past their term-time limit, or a follow-up check that nobody diarised.

We review right to work processes against the current rules, train the people who carry out checks, and audit existing records so you know which workers need a fresh check before an enforcement visit tells you. Where you employ students, second-job workers or people with pending applications, we help you set up the extra evidence and reminders those groups need. Find out more about our right to work check service and our wider immigration compliance support.

Conclusion

A right to work check is simple to do and easy to do wrongly. The protection it gives depends entirely on detail: the right method for the evidence the person holds, the original document in your hands, the date properly recorded, the result saved, and a follow-up check before any permission ends. Get those right for every worker, in the same way every time, and you have a complete defence against a civil penalty.

Build the process around the rules in force on the day you check, keep the evidence for two years after each person leaves, and look again at your process whenever the Home Office updates its guidance, because the check you carry out today will be judged by the rules that apply today.

Glossary