Speeches

David Crausby – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Crausby on 2014-06-05.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the change in waiting times for an initial decision for Tier 1 (Entrepreneur) visa applications in the last year; what the average waiting time is for an initial decision for a Tier 1 application; and what assessment she has made of the economic effect of the time taken for such decisions on economic growth.

James Brokenshire

The average waiting time for a Tier 1 (Entrepreneur) customer in the financial
year 2013-14 was 125 calendar days. The number of days taken to process
applications dropped by 50 days over the course of the financial year and
processing times continue to decrease.

A record number of applications were decided in the financial year 2013-14, and
there is nothing to suggest that processing times are deterring entrepreneurs
from applying.

Month Despatched

Average Calendar Days Between Application Raised Date and Despatch Date

Apr-13

131

May-13

148

Jun-13

142

Jul-13

129

Aug-13

134

Sep-13

126

Oct-13

96

Nov-13

108

Dec-13

114

Jan-14

141

Feb-14

97

Mar-14

81

Overall Average / Total Cases

125