Beware of fraudulent immigration agents promising lucrative jobs abroad
by Guneet S - December 7, 2009
United Kingdom, December 7: Are you looking for a job visa and is your immigration agent asking for big cash in lieu of providing you job visa? Well, you need to think twice about this as increased number of innocent visa applicants are being cheated by rogue employers abroad.
All this has sent the immigration officials looking for culprit employers in various Western countries.
In one such recent case, immigration officials sealed the Noble House Chinese Restaurant in UK and discovered nearly eight illegal migrants working on rolls of the restaurant.
Situated in Ray Street, Heanor, the restaurant had employed seven Chinese nationals, including three men and four women and one Malaysian man. All of them were aged between 18 and 48 years.
The management of this take-away restaurant is facing a fine of nearly £80,000 after a move was introduced by the immigration department in February 2008 calling for a series of civil penalties for the firms employing illegal migrants.
Apart from this restaurant, nearly sever other firms were found to be guilty of enrolling illegal migrants as employees earlier this year.
The head of the East Midlands Local Immigration Team run by the UK Border Agency, Phil Dyer, said, “ We find that there are two types of employers, ones that are compliant and unaware that a staff member is working illegally, and rogue employers who disregard laws, breach health and safety regulations and don’t pay taxes to HM Revenue and Customs.”
And “It is the rogue employers that we are clamping down on,” added Dyer.
The illegal workers of the Noble House Chinese Restaurant are facing deportation.
Talking about the recent cases of illegal workers employed by several businesses in Derbyshire, Mr. Dyer stated, “In Derbyshire we find that illegal workers are being mainly employed in food processing factories, fast-food outlets and restaurants.
"In other parts of the East Midlands it is agricultural businesses, knit-wear factories and sweat shops.”
Mr. Dyer said that the recent civil penalties are working to bring down the number of rogue employers to a great extent. "There is an issue with illegal workers but we believe that the civil penalties are having an impact and expect that the amount of fines will go down instead of up as the message gets across,” affirmed Dyer
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