OTS Successful In over £200k Tier 1 Entrepreneur Case

Our client TZ, a national of China, approached OTS Solicitors after refusal of her leave to remain as a Tier 1 Entrepreneur Visa and a high net worth investor. She had previously been granted leave to enter as Tier 1 entrepreneur applicant and had established successful businesses in the UK into which she had invested significant amount of funds. At the time of her extension application she was the director of the company she incorporated and was employing 4 workers.

Her Tier 1 entrepreneur extension application was refused for alleged failure to provide a piece of specified evidence. As our client approached our business investment and Immigration department after refusal of her application that carried a right of administrative review our business immigration lawyers conducted an initial consultation to assess the reasons of refusal and any possible grounds of challenge.

The client was advised that the missing evidence was not mandatory, as the other documents provided with her leave to remain application provided the specified information. She was also advised of her options and that administrative review was her next step as an investor she would not have a right of appeal. She was advised that this was a statutory remedy and, although it was unlikely to succeed due to the Home Office established practice of refusing administrative review requests, our lawyers explained that any judicial review claim was unlikely to succeed if administrative review was not sought.

While administrative review was pending, our investment and Tier 1 entrepreneur Immigration team requested the client's file from previous representatives, in order to carry full assessment of the case to detect any possible and hidden issues that might lead to further refusals.

After receiving the expected refusal of the administrative review, our lawyers issued the Home office with a pre-action letter requesting withdrawal of the erroneous decision and reconsideration of our client's Tier 1 entrepreneur decision. Our business immigration lawyers argued that specified information had been provided and as such was sufficient. Further to this, argument was made, based on home office evidential flexibility policy, that the Respondent should have requested any such further evidence they felt necessary for considering the application.

No response was received in the 14 days allowed for the Respondent to respond to the pre-action letter. judicial review proceedings were started and lodged. On the same day, after the lodging of the judicial review claim, response was received from the Respondent, agreeing to reconsider our client's application. Negotiations started with the Respondent to settle the judicial review claim and the Respondent, also agreed to pay our client's costs.

Shortly after, our business immigration team was contacted by the Home Office confirming a new decision was made and that our client was to be granted 2 years further leave in Tier 1 entrepreneur category and our client would continue to invest in ther UK businesses.