The salary minimum for a Skilled Worker visa is not a single number. It's a computed minimum derived from two intersecting datasets: the general threshold set by the Home Office and the occupation-specific going rate tied to ASHE data. Any eligibility system that treats this as a static figure is building in systematic failure points.
Here's the data model you need to implement correctly.
The Core Computation
The salary minimum for a given application is:
required_salary = max(general_threshold, going_rate[soc_code])
For new entrants (first five years post-graduation, or student visa switchers), the computation is:
new_entrant_required = max(general_threshold * 0.70, going_rate[soc_code] * 0.70)
The general threshold is currently £38,700 (since April 2024). New entrant general threshold: £27,090.
The going rate is occupation-specific and indexed to the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE). The Home Office updates going rates annually via the Immigration Rules Appendix Skilled Worker — the effective date for the most recent update is April 2025.
The SOC Code Problem
The biggest source of eligibility errors in HR systems is not the threshold — it is SOC code mapping.
SOC 2020, not SOC 2010. The Appendix Skilled Worker uses SOC 2020 codes. Many HR systems were built when SOC 2010 was current. If your occupational data is mapped to SOC 2010 and you are not translating to SOC 2020, you are likely querying the wrong going rate or hitting a null result.
One role, multiple valid codes. A senior software engineer might legitimately map to 2136 (Programmers and software development professionals) or 2139 (IT business analysts) depending on how the role is structured. The going rates differ. Your system should flag ambiguous mappings for human review rather than defaulting silently to the lowest applicable rate.
Code changes after CoS issuance. A Home Office caseworker can assign a different SOC code than the one on the Certificate of Sponsorship if they determine the code does not match the actual duties. Build a discrepancy check at CoS drafting stage — cross-reference the proposed SOC code against the job description before submission.
What Can and Cannot Count as Salary
Includable:
- Guaranteed basic pay
- London weighting if contractually guaranteed
- Employer-provided accommodation up to the regulatory limit (currently £8,320/year if meals excluded; £9,646/year if meals included)
- Travel-to-work allowances that meet the definition in the Immigration Rules
Excluded:
- Discretionary bonuses (performance, holiday, annual)
- Irregular overtime or shift premiums not guaranteed by contract
- Expense reimbursements
- Equity, stock options, or RSUs (no cash equivalent at point of assessment)
The operative criterion is "guaranteed." Commission-heavy compensation packages create particular problems: the base salary needs to hit the threshold independently.
Immigration Salary List — No Salary Discount
If your occupation mapping checks against the old Shortage Occupation List (SOL) to apply an 80% discount, remove that logic. The SOL was abolished in April 2024 and replaced by the Immigration Salary List (ISL). The ISL exempts workers in listed occupations from certain visa fees paid by the employer, but carries zero salary threshold reduction for the worker.
Any system still applying the legacy 20% SOL discount is generating incorrect eligibility assessments.
Rate Update Frequency and Temporal Validity
Going rates update annually (typically April). Your eligibility system needs a versioned rate table — not a live lookup — because:
- A CoS issued before a going rate update remains valid if the salary met the threshold at time of issuance
- You need to audit historical decisions against the rate table current at that time, not today's rates
- Applications in-flight when a rate update occurs are assessed against the rate effective at the CoS issue date, not the application submission date
Implement this as a temporal table with effective-date ranges per SOC code. Point-in-time queries are essential for accurate retrospective and prospective checks.
Data Source
The canonical source is the Immigration Rules Appendix Skilled Worker, published on GOV.UK. This appendix is updated when rates change — there is no official version history or machine-readable release. Rate tables need to be parsed from the HTML and versioned by your system on each update cycle.
For a live reference implementation of sponsor licence status verification and threshold modelling, see immigrationgpt.co.uk.
This is a technical reference for HR and compliance tooling. It does not constitute legal advice. Verify all thresholds against current Immigration Rules before implementation.
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