Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 6
37th Report - Immigration: Skilled worker visas
Published 4 Jul 2025
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Immigration: Skilled worker visas All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
The Home Office has not done enough to understand the experience of customers and improve the service they receive. The Home Office has achieved good performance in managing ‘straightforward’ applications – processing 94% of these within its service standards in 2023 and 2024 (970,000 cases). However, it takes much longer to process applications on which the applicant has not provided all of the information and further checks are needed to make a decision – which represented 18% of applications between the end of 2021 and 2024 (330,000 cases). The Home Office refers to these as ‘complex’ applications, it removes these from its public reporting and has no target processing time. Further, the Home Office does not have reliable data on the processing times for ‘complex’ cases and sponsor licence applications, which means it does not fully understand its performance. The Home Office’s target of 80% of applicants being satisfied with the application service illustrates a lack of ambition, suggesting it is content with one in five of its customers being dissatisfied. It is not doing enough to understand the customer perspective and make improvements to its service, including addressing concerns from applicants and sponsors about complicated guidance and poor customer support. Applicants and sponsors are also unable to track the progress of their applications, which is the cause of many complaints about the service. The Home Office’s planned transformation of its sponsorship system has also been delayed and it needs to address operational issues with the IT system used for processing visa applications. recommendation In its Treasury Minute response to this report, the Home Office should set out how it is improving its customer service. As part of this, it should: • develop and publish a balanced scorecard showing its performance in processing all applications (including ‘complex’ cases) and providing a good customer service; • set and publish more stretching targets for cu
From: Public Accounts Committee, 37th Report - Immigration: Skilled worker visas (HC 819), 4 July 2025
Government response
Latest Treasury Minutes progress report to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirty-seventh Report of Session 2024-26
The government responded to the whole report on 4 June 2026 (deadline 4 September 2025).
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirty-seventh report from Session 2024-26
Published 15 October 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government agrees with the Committee's recommendations on labour market evidence, evaluation, care workers, exploitation and compliance, but disagrees with the recommendation on customer service.
- On sector workforce analysis, it agrees that other departments should provide more rigorous analysis, with a target implementation date of July 2026, and says the Labour Market Evidence Group "will further strengthen collaboration" between the Home Office and departments leading on labour market and skills.
- It agrees to set out its evaluation of the Skilled Worker route, with a target date of October 2025, stating that the evaluation was published alongside the Immigration White Paper on 12 May.
- On exploitation, it agrees with the recommendation (target date April 2027) and says an update to the Committee is planned for April 2027, "one year after its creation" of the Fair Work Agency.
- It disagrees with the customer service recommendation, stating the Home Office "is committed to continuous improvement in customer service standards" and that it monitors key indicators.