Health and Care Worker Visa For Ghanaians

The UK Health and Care Worker visa is designed for Ghanaian professional healthcare workers to enter the UK and work for licensed employers in eligible health roles in the adult care sector (working as senior carers), NHS (National Health Service), or an NHS supplier.

The UK authorities designed the Health and Care Worker visa to help meet the demands for professional healthcare workers in the UK healthcare sector. Ghanaian applicants who hold this visa have the opportunity to settle in the UK permanently.

The Health Care Worker visa allows its holder to enter the UK and stay for up to 5 years and can extend it for as many times as they want.

Alternatively, the visa holder can apply for indefinite leave to remain (settled status) after staying in the UK for 5 years, provided they meet all the requirements.

With the settled status, the applicant will no longer be restricted by the rules of their visa sponsorship. This means that the applicant will be free to change employers or jobs without applying for another visa.

Page Contents

• What Is The UK Health and Care Worker Visa?
• Health and Care Worker Visa Eligibility & Requirements For Employers & Employees
• Application Fees for the Health and Care Worker Visa
• Health and Care Worker Visa Step By Step Application Process
• The Typical Application Processing Time
• Extending / Renewing The Health and Care Worker Visa
• What Health and Care Workers Can And Cannot Do
• Bringing Dependants
• How Can Total Law Help?
• Frequently Asked Questions

As a UK-licensed employer, to sponsor a Ghanaian health and care worker, you must:

• Apply online for a worker’s licence
• Be enrolled into the Care Quality Commission (CQC)
• Provide an open position that is eligible for sponsorship
• Have a suitable business
• Pay the sponsor licence application fee (£1,579 for medium and large organisations or £574 for small businesses and charities)

Your prospective Ghanaian employee must meet the Health and Care visa UK requirements. They must:

• Be certified nurses, doctors, health professionals, or adult social care professionals
• Have received a CoS (Certificate of Sponsorship) from you stating the roles you have offered them
• Be working in one of the eligible roles in the social or healthcare sector
• Have received a job offer from you
• Meet the salary requirements typically earning about £25,000 per year. However, meeting this requirement depends on the type of job role
• Meet the Health and Care visa UK IELTS requirement. Be able to read, write, speak and understand English to a minimum of B1 on the Common European Framework of Reference for Language (CEFR) scale. If you have a degree-level academic qualification that was taught in English or you’re from a majority English-speaking country, you’ll be exempted from meeting this requirement

Ghanaian professional healthcare workers seeking to obtain Health and Care visas must pay their visa application fees depending on how long they intend to stay in the country. The fees they must pay include:

• £304 for 3 years per applicant
• £590 for more than 3 years per applicant
• £19.20 for biometric information

Note that the above-mentioned fees must be paid whether the applicant is applying from outside or within the UK. Ghanaian applicants must also have up to £1,270 in their bank accounts for their upkeep when they enter the UK.

The UKVI takes the UK Health and Care Worker visa applications as a top priority. For this reason, the UK Health and Care visa processing time typically takes about 3 weeks. However, your application may be delayed for some reasons, including:

• Incorrect information is found in your application
• Further documents are needed by the UKVI to process your application
• Your documents need to be verified
• The workload for the UKVI

The UK Health and Care Worker visa is valid for 5 years. You can apply to extend this visa before it expires provided you continue to meet all the eligibility requirements that granted you the visa initially. You must still be employed by the same employer that issued you a certificate of sponsorship and you must still be working in the same role with the same occupation code.

If you do not want to extend this visa, you can alternatively apply for indefinite leave to remain, provided you meet all the requirements. With your indefinite leave to remain status in the UK, you’ll be free from most UK immigration restrictions.

Ghanaian applicants seeking to obtain a Health and Care Worker visa have certain rights and restrictions in the UK. When you obtain the visa you will be allowed to:

• Get an additional job (depending on the situation)
• Do voluntary work
• Study
• Work in an eligible job
• Bring your dependents to come and join you in the UK (if eligible)
• Leave and re-enter the UK
• Seek permanent settlement in the UK after living in the country for up to 5 years and meeting other requirements

You will not be allowed to:

• Switch jobs or employers unless your visa is updated
• Access public funds or State Pension

You will be able to bring your dependent children and a partner or spouse with you to the UK on a Health and Care Worker visa.

Note that changes in March 2024 mean that Health and Care Worker visa holders (Senior Care Workers SOC code 6146 and Care Workers SOC code 6145) are no longer allowed to bring their family members to the UK via the dependent visa route.

Your dependents must apply for their visa separately to yours, but at the same time. You must also show proof of your family connection to them and show proof of additional funds to support them in the UK.