Passport Checks As Part Of Pre Employment Screening
Detailed passport checks are important.
It’s common knowledge that hefty fines are levied on any UK business caught employing anyone without the legal right to work in Britain, whihc is why background checks are becoming more of a priority for businesses. That includes a wide range of people who have a perfectly legitimate right to be or to reside in the UK, but who don’t have permission to work. Those on holiday visas, which may stand for a period of several months, and student visas, which can apply for years at a time, are included in that category.
If it can be shown that you know that one of your employees doesn’t have the right paperwork, penalties can be extremely serious and involve up to two years in prison. If you didn’t know, it’s a much less serious offence, but few businesses can shrug off a £10,000 fine. Ignorance is not a strong enough defence to avoid the fine, even if you did do a quick passport check yourself. The passport could be a fake or the passport number altered, and a quick visual once over won’t pick that up. There are also subtleties - different regulations apply to Bulgarian and Romanian citizens, for instance.
It is well worth including a thorough passport check in the pre employment screening process even if the potential employee speaks perfect English and has been resident in the UK for a significant time. It should not be restricted to lower paid industries either. Candidates applying for academic and scientific positions after graduation and the expiry of student visas are a particularly strong example.
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