A practical guide for UK employers on your legal obligations, the documents you must accept, and how to protect your business from civil penalties of up to £60,000 per illegal worker.
If you employ people in the UK, carrying out right to work checks is not optional. It is a legal requirement under the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006, and the Home Office can inspect your records at any time. Get it wrong, and your business faces not only significant financial penalties but potential reputational damage that is hard to recover from.
The good news is that with a clear, consistent process in place, right to work compliance does not have to be complicated. This guide explains exactly what you need to do, when to do it, and how to make sure your checks hold up if you are ever audited.
Key legal point
Employers have a legal duty to check that every person they employ has the right to work in the UK, before employment begins. This applies to all new hires, regardless of nationality. Assuming someone has the right to work because of how they look or sound is both unlawful discrimination and a compliance failure.
A right to work check is the process by which an employer verifies that a prospective employee is legally permitted to work in the United Kingdom. The check must take place before the employee’s first day of work, and the outcome must be documented and retained throughout the employment and for two years after it ends.
This applies to every new hire, regardless of nationality, including those on zero-hours contracts, temporary agency staff, and workers taken on through a third party. It also covers less obvious cases: sponsored academic visitors, external examiners, visiting professors or fellows receiving an honorarium, and guest lecturers or other unpaid voluntary roles. A continuous service gap of more than three months, or no existing right to work check on file, also triggers the requirement to check again.
There are three types of right to work check currently available to employers in the UK.
| Check type | Who it applies to | How it works |
| Manual document check | Most workers, particularly British and Irish nationals who do not have access to digital services | Employer inspects original documents, copies them, and signs and dates the copy |
| Online Home Office check | Workers with a Biometric Residence Permit, status under the EU Settlement Scheme, or a digital immigration status | Worker shares a share code; employer checks the status online via gov.uk |
| Identity Service Provider (IDSP) check | British and Irish nationals with a valid passport | A certified IDSP carries out identity document validation technology (IDVT) checks remotely |
The Home Office publishes a defined list of acceptable documents, split into two lists. An employer can establish a statutory excuse (a legal defence against penalties) either by checking one document from List A or by checking a combination of documents from List B.
If a worker provides a document from List A, they have an unrestricted right to work in the UK. You will not need to carry out a repeat check during employment. List A documents include:
List B documents show that a worker currently has the right to work, but that right expires at a set date. You must carry out a follow-up check before that date. List B documents include a current passport endorsed with a limited leave to remain, a current Biometric Residence Permit with an expiry date, and a current entry vantage stamp or certificate of entitlement.
Important reminder
You cannot simply accept a document that looks genuine. You must check that the document is valid, that the photograph and personal details match the person in front of you, and that it has not been tampered with. If you are in any doubt, contact the Home Office Employer Checking Service before proceeding.
Ask the candidate to provide original documents from the Home Office acceptable documents list. Do not accept photocopies or scanned versions for a manual check.
Inspect the documents in person (or via a live video link if using a certified IDSP). Verify the photo matches the individual, the dates are valid, and all details are consistent across documents.
Photocopy or scan all relevant pages of each document. For passports, copy the photo page and any page containing an endorsement relevant to the right to work. For birth certificates, copy the whole document.
Write the date the check was carried out on the copy, and sign it. This confirms that the check was done before employment started and provides your statutory excuse.
Retain the copies for the duration of employment and for at least two years after employment ends. Records must be stored securely in line with your GDPR and data protection obligations.
A poorly structured onboarding process leaves compliance gaps that are difficult to spot until an audit arrives. Read our guide on what to include in your new employee starter form to ensure right to work checks are captured alongside every other key step from day one.
For workers who hold a Biometric Residence Permit, EU Settlement Scheme status, or another form of digital immigration status, an online right to work check is both more efficient and more secure than a manual one. The worker generates a share code through the Home Office’s online right to work checking service, and you use that code alongside their date of birth to view their immigration status in real time.
It is important to understand that you cannot force a worker to use the online service if they are a British or Irish national with a physical document. Some workers may not have online access to their status, or may prefer to provide a physical document. You must accept whichever valid method applies to them.
When you complete an online check, make sure you print and retain the results page, or save a copy, as evidence that the check was conducted. The share code itself is not sufficient proof.
Since April 2022, employers have been able to use certified IDSPs to conduct right to work checks on British and Irish nationals remotely, using Identity Document Validation Technology (IDVT). This option is particularly useful if you recruit nationally or have remote workers who cannot easily attend in person.
Using a certified IDSP does not transfer your legal responsibility. You must still satisfy yourself that the check has been carried out correctly and that the result is consistent with the person you are employing. The Home Office maintains a register of certified IDSPs, and you should only use providers on that list.
Best practice tip
Whether you carry out checks manually, online, or via an IDSP, document your process in writing. A short internal procedure note, included in your HR policies, demonstrates to the Home Office that right to work compliance is embedded in your business, not an afterthought.
If you have employed someone whose right to work has an expiry date, you must carry out a repeat check before that date passes. Failing to do so removes your statutory excuse, meaning you could face a civil penalty even if the worker genuinely had the right to work at the point of hire.
A simple way to manage this is to build expiry date tracking into your HR systems or calendar. Set a reminder at least eight to twelve weeks before the expiry date, so there is time to request updated documents, contact the Home Office Employer Checking Service if needed, and make an informed decision if the worker’s status cannot be verified.
If a worker’s leave expires and they cannot demonstrate a continued right to work, you must not continue to employ them while a resolution is sought. Taking advice at this stage is important to avoid both a civil penalty and a potential unfair dismissal claim.
The penalties for employing someone without the right to work increased significantly in February 2024. Employers now face civil penalties of up to £45,000 per worker for a first offence, rising to £60,000 per worker for repeat breaches. In serious cases, the illegal working offence can result in an unlimited fine and up to five years in prison for the employer.
Penalty alert: 2024 changes
Civil penalties for employing illegal workers increased substantially from January 2024. The maximum first-offence penalty rose from £20,000 to £45,000 per worker, and repeat offences now carry a penalty of up to £60,000. These are not fines reserved for large businesses. The Home Office pursues employers of all sizes.
Crucially, the penalty can apply even if you did not know the worker had no right to work, if you failed to carry out a proper check. A correctly conducted and documented check provides a statutory excuse, meaning you will not face a civil penalty if the worker used fraudulent documents. Without that evidence, your defence is significantly weakened.
Understanding your broader employment law obligations is just as important as compliance with specific checks. Our article on how HR deals with employment law gives a useful overview of where legal responsibility sits within your business.
Audits and investigations regularly reveal the same patterns of non-compliance. The most common issues include:
The most effective way to stay compliant is to treat right to work checks as a non-negotiable step in your wider onboarding and induction process, not a standalone task that gets delegated informally.
Building it into a formal induction checklist means it cannot be missed, even during busy periods or when your usual HR contact is absent. Our guide on creating an effective induction checklist explains how to structure your onboarding so that compliance steps like right to work checks are captured consistently for every new hire.
Similarly, making sure your disciplinary and HR policies are robust and up to date means you are in a stronger position if an issue does arise after hire. See our article on following ACAS disciplinary and grievance procedures for more on keeping your employment practices legally defensible.
Our free HR Health Check identifies gaps in your current HR processes, including right to work compliance, contracts, policies, and onboarding, so you can fix issues before they become problems.
✅ Get your free HR Health Check
No. The duty to check applies to new hires only. You are not required to re-check employees hired before the current system was introduced, unless you were already required to carry out repeat checks for that individual due to a time-limited immigration status.
Yes, in certain circumstances. If a worker holds a digital immigration status, you can use the Home Office online service without meeting in person. For British and Irish nationals with a valid passport, you can use a certified IDSP to conduct checks remotely. For other manual checks, the Home Office temporary Covid-era adjustments have ended, and checks should now be conducted in person or via a certified provider.
You should not allow the person to start work until you have completed a valid check and established your statutory excuse. If a worker is awaiting a document from the Home Office, you can request confirmation from the Home Office Employer Checking Service. If they confirm the person has a right to work, that confirmation provides your statutory excuse for a period of six months.
Generally, the responsibility for checking agency workers sits with the employment agency that supplies them. However, you should always confirm this in writing with your agency partner, and keep records of that confirmation. If the agency fails to conduct proper checks, the position can be more complex, so it is worth seeking HR or legal advice if you are unsure.
This is a sensitive situation that requires prompt and careful action. You should take specialist HR advice before doing anything else. Continuing to employ the person while their status is unresolved could constitute the criminal offence of knowingly employing an illegal worker, but you also have obligations under employment law that must be considered. Centric HR can support you through exactly this kind of situation.
From employment contracts and onboarding to ongoing compliance support, Centric HR provides practical, expert-led HR solutions with no long-term contracts. Call us on 03333 660 567 or get in touch online.
