The UK has seen a rise in student visa risk factors such as fraudulent documents and issues surrounding English proficiency, despite being a generally compliant route, according to UKVI.
“With the rise in overall application volumes that we’ve seen coming in we have seen a slight increase in the volume of forged documentation provided and from particular nationalities as well, particularly around bank statements” said Oliver Rae, deputy director, study operations, UKVI.
Rae did not specify which nationalities have had an increase in such risk factors.
According to Rae, UKVI is working to eliminate fraudulent documents, which includes bank statements and educational certificates, as well as working with sponsors that may have either been targeted or have seen an increase in a particular type of risk.
“We’ve been working with a number of institutions that have seen an increase in students arriving and being issued with a CAS and a visa and then applied for asylum fairly quickly within their arrival to the UK,” he said.
“It obviously indicates on occasions that they’re not genuine students and are trying to use a student route for for that purpose.”
Students’ insufficient claims of having a particular level of English language is an recent topic of engagement, said Rae, with some students not being at “the level expected against the immigration rules”, when encountered at the visa application stage or at the border upon arrival to the UK.
Despite this, Rae noted that student visas are a “generally compliant route in the visa world”, with an average 3% refusal rate.
“We want to continue to work to bring that down as much as we can.”
At The PIE Live Europe event held in London, Rae was asked about the risk to universities of working with the private sector to increase admissions capacity.
We always encourage people to approach us about potential partnerships before jumping in
“The sponsor guidance is very thorough on that, we always encourage people to approach us about potential partnerships and potential links before jumping in. We can have a conversation with our response team around the pros and cons of that from a guidance position,” said Rae.
The PIE understands that at least one UK university has been recommended by UKVI against outsourcing its admissions processing due to risk.
“We know that agents often use sub-agents… but ultimately whether that comes through that particular cycle or that particular route, it is on the sponsor in terms of taking responsibility from there.”
In the UK, educators must report details of any third parties that have helped with international student recruitment to the Home Office, or risk action being taken against them.
