Question: Getting a Job and Moving to UK

7 points by thekillerdev 13 years ago | 7 comments

Why is it so hard to get a job in UK with a company that helps Non UK citizen seeking work authorization? Is there some kind of prejudgement or something like this, with people from Brazil and countries around here? I am a Designer and Developer, i have quite good jobs, fully 7 years of experience and yet, agencies around UK don't want to help on the work authorization so i could move to UK.

This question is beeing made because over the last year, i sent around 40 CV to different agencies on UK and only ONE answered and saying they couldn't help.

jdietrich 13 years ago |

UK companies can hire workers from anywhere within the EU without any sort of bureaucracy - EU citizens have an automatic right to work anywhere in the EU. The EU includes a number of low-wage countries with good numbers of skilled developers.

There is currently some amount of anti-immigration sentiment in many EU countries, mainly because of the recession. Governments can do nothing to restrict intra-EU migration, so tend to make life hard for non-EU migrants to look tough on immigration. The current British government is tightening quotas on non-EU immigration.

A British company is unlikely to even look at your CV if there's another qualified applicant in the pile, because of the cost and complexity of employing a non-EU worker.

There is no shortage of generalist developers in the UK and wages are significantly lower than in the US. Unless you have some specialised skills, your job search is likely to be quite arduous.

thekillerdev 13 years ago |

Hello oschrenk i often use this website http://uk.authenticjobs.com/ but mostly i search on google by UK companies and send then the CV.

jdietrich it is good to know about those things, actually i have been struggling to find news about this but i think is just a general sentiment and not a guideline..

ig1, and jacknews you both are right for sure, i've got this feeling from the companies, they are really looking for exceptional skills and not hiring anyone who can be replaced by a local talent.

thanks for clarifying even if it's a almost no hope effort.

oschrenk 13 years ago | |

Thanks, bookmarked.

Peroni 13 years ago |

Shameless plug: http://www.hackerjobs.co.uk

As others have pointed out, it's near impossible to find an employer willing to assist you in the process in gaining the appropriate visas. Time and effort aside, immigration law in the UK is a legal minefield and unless the company has a previous history of hiring non-EU nationals then they probably won't even look at your CV unfortunately.

jacknews 13 years ago |

Most countries have a policy of only issuing work visas to foreigners who have an exceptional skill. That is, the role can't be filled by local talent. I'm not sure web design/development alone meets that definition. In addition, the paperwork is onerous for any hiring company. Why do you think you have the right to work in the UK?

ig1 13 years ago |

It's become a lot harder to get work visas for the UK since they closed the Tier-1/HSMP program a few years ago. Under the new visa system the only people who are likely to be willing to sponsor you are large firms (IBM, Google, investment banks, etc.) who have the capacity to deal with the overheads required.

oschrenk 13 years ago |

I'm planning to try the same. Would you have some pointers where to start my job search? Did you write to specific companies or did you start your search by crawling job offer sites?