All Articles: digitisation

As someone who is in the UK with leave to remain, I recently tried the new eVisa system for myself and thought it would be useful to share my experience. Biometric residence permits produced in the past few years have “31 December 2024” as the expiry date. This reflects the...

8th August 2024
BY Brian Dikoff

There is a lot that remains unclear about the Home Office’s introduction of eVisas, below we shed light on what we know so far about the roll out and use of eVisas. We also have a separate step by step guide on applying for an eVisa. In line with its...

15th July 2024
BY Zeena Luchowa

When the pandemic first hit in March 2020 the Home Office was quick off the mark in allowing employers to conduct right to work checks remotely. Rather than having to meet job applicants and employees needing to renew their status in person, they were able to do so via a...

26th September 2022
BY Nichola Carter

A new law preventing migrants from using their residence permits to prove their right to rent or work in the UK is coming into force without robust parliamentary debate. From 6 April 2022, no migrant in the UK will be able to use their biometric residence permit or card as...

5th April 2022
BY Alexandra Sinclair

Employers who want to avoid the possibility of a fine for hiring an unauthorised migrant are well advised to carry out right to work checks. Such checks are not mandatory, but where companies do carry them out, the Home Office advises that “all potential employees, including British citizens” be checked...

20th January 2022
BY CJ McKinney

The Home Office is now conceding three out of every ten immigration appeals before the hearing, a senior immigration judge has said. Michael Clements, President of the First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber), puts the cheerful stat down to a new online appeal process. President Clements was speaking at a...

23rd September 2021
BY CJ McKinney

The Nationality and Borders Bill 2021 has lain dormant over the summer but will be taken up again once Parliament returns on 6 September. Down in the miscellaneous provisions is a requirement for people entering the UK without a visa or British/Irish passport to register in advance. Known as electronic...

1st September 2021
BY CJ McKinney

The Home Office has rebuffed Public Law Project’s (PLP) latest attempt to find out more about the secret algorithmic criteria used to decide whether a proposed marriage should be investigated as a “sham”. Sham marriage investigations can be invasive and unpleasant and it appears that they are targeted at some...

21st July 2021
BY Tatiana Kazim

All being well, the government’s advice to work from home should be lifted from 21 June. With offices filling up, and city streets bustling, normal working life is already starting to resume. But remote working patterns are clearly popular with workers and employers, and are likely to be around for...

1st June 2021
BY Joanna Hunt

The Home Office published a New Plan for Immigration “strategy statement” earlier today. It is mostly about legal immigration and economic migrants, as opposed to the New Plan for Immigration document published in March that focused on illegal immigration and asylum seekers. Home Secretary Priti Patel marked its publication with...

24th May 2021
BY CJ McKinney

Last month, UN special rapporteur on racism Professor Tendayi Achiume raised concerns about the impact of digital technologies on human rights. Achiume’s comments come at a time when governments are relying more and more on digital tools to control migration. In the UK, we’ve already seen the government use data...

21st December 2020
BY Sahdya Darr

Right to Rent checks can be carried out online and in real time from 25 November 2020 onwards. Under the new scheme, landlords will be able to conduct checks on whether prospective tenants are permitted to rent using a Home Office webpage (not yet live). For now, the online checking...

9th November 2020
BY Larry Lock

Digital-only residence permits could make it harder for migrants to access vital services like jobs and housing, a new report warns. Landlords and employers used to physical passports and residence permits may discriminate against migrants whose proof of immigration status only exists online, according to the Public Law Project. Millions...

1st October 2020
BY CJ McKinney

Earlier this year JCWI, with the help of Foxglove, launched a legal challenge against the Home Office over its use of an algorithmic “streaming tool” that assigned risk categories to visa applications. The tool, previously covered on Free Movement, scored visa applicants for risk based in part on their nationality....

4th August 2020
BY Chai Patel

Immigration lawyers are warning that changes to legal aid for appeals lodged online during the coronavirus pandemic “will do irreparable harm”. The Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association (ILPA) says that adjustments to legal aid rates will deter lawyers from taking on the most complex cases and push already cash-strapped legal aid...

19th May 2020
BY CJ McKinney

You’ve met with your client, taken detailed instructions and advised them on the intricacies of the Immigration Rules, the maze of policy guidance and possibly even made highfalutin’ reference to case law relevant to their situation. Now you’ve actually got to put in their immigration application. And this is where...

6th March 2020
BY Bryony Rest

The Home Office should release more details about a “cryptic” computer programme that scores visa applicants as high, medium and low risk, the immigration inspector has recommended. David Bolt says that while applicants labelled high risk are not being automatically refused visas, officials should “demystify” the tool to allay concerns...

6th February 2020
BY CJ McKinney

In the fraught context of Brexit, the need to register EU citizens already resident in the UK presents a major conundrum of policy, law, and administration. The government’s answer is the EU Settlement Scheme. It is expected that millions of people, from a wide variety of different backgrounds, will apply...

16th July 2019
BY Joe Tomlinson

In addition to the deluge of new Immigration Rules and legislation we faced in the May years, and now the looming Brexit iceberg, a major (if inevitable) change of recent times has been the digitisation of immigration applications. Unlike with Rules and legislation changes, there was little opportunity to scrutinise...

8th January 2019
BY Jonathan Kingham

In a recent determination, the President of the Upper Tribunal suggested that documents and submissions could be sent electronically to the tribunal in order to facilitate efficient justice: …parties and their representatives are strongly encouraged to communicate electronically with the Tribunal and, further, to seek confirmation that important communications and/or...

26th February 2015
BY Colin Yeo
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