If you currently have permission to stay in the UK under any of the following immigration categories, you can apply to Tier 2 (General) from inside the UK:

• any Tier 1 category
• Tier 2 (Sportsperson)
• Tier 2 (Minister of religion)
• Tier 2 (Intra company transfer: established staff), if you are applying to switch sponsor
• Tier 2 (Intra company transfer) under the Immigration Rules n place before 6 April 2010, if you are applying to change sponsor
• any Tier 4 category
• Tier 5 (Temporary worker - creative and sporting), for a job as a professional footballer - but you must meet the Tier 2 requirements, including English language
• dependent partner of a Tier 4 migrant 
• Highly Skilled Migrant Programme
• innovator
• Fresh Talent: Working in Scotland Scheme
• International Graduates Scheme (or its predecessor, the Science and Engineering Graduate Scheme)
• Business and Commercial work permits (except multiple entry work permits)
• Sports and Entertainment work permits (except multiple entry work permits)
• Jewish agency employee
• Member of the operational ground staff of an overseas-owned airline
• minister of religion, missionary or member of a religious order
• overseas qualified nurse or midwife
• person writing up a thesis
• postgraduate doctor or dentist
• representative of an overseas business
• representative of an overseas newspaper, news agency or broadcasting organisation
• student
• student re-sitting an examination
• student nurse
• student union sabbatical officer

If you are not in any of these categories, you must leave the UK and make your Tier 2 (General) application from abroad.

If you are switching from Tier 4 or the former categories of student, student nurse, student re-sitting an examination or student union sabbatical officer, you must have current permission to stay in the UK and, during that permission to stay, you must have lawfully obtained a UK degree, postgraduate certificate in education or professional graduate diploma of education. You must have obtained one of the named qualifications. They do not include, for example, vocational qualifications at degree level which are not degrees.

If you are a PhD student, you do not need to have completed your course, but you must have completed at least 12 months' study towards it in the UK.

Switching from a post-study category

You can be assigned a certificate of sponsorship and score 30 points if you are switching from:

• Tier 1 (Post-study work)
• Fresh Talent: Working in Scotland Scheme
• International Graduate Scheme (or its predecessor, the Science and Engineering Graduate Scheme)
• any Tier 4 category
• student
• student re-sitting an examination
• student nurse
• student union sabbatical officer.

If you are switching from student, student re-sitting an examination, student nurse or student union sabbatical officer, you must have current permission to stay in that category.

If you do not meet these requirements, you will need to claim points for sponsorship in another way (such as through a resident labour market test).

If you send your application form and application fee by post, the date of application is the date of posting. This is decided by the postmark. If the postmark is illegible or missing, the date of postage is taken as being at least 1 day before it is received by us.

If you send your application form and application fee by courier, the date of application is the date when it is delivered to our payment handling service.

If you are applying in person at one of our public enquiry offices, your application date will be the date when you attend the public enquiry office to make your application and pay your application fee.

Withdrawal of application

If you want to withdraw your application, you must use the 'return of documents form' on the right side of this page. Your application will not be considered, and we will return your documents to you with no decision. We will not refund the cost of your application if you use this form.       

If you submit the request before 12:00, we will aim to withdraw your application and return your documents on the same day. We will return your documents by standard recorded delivery. If you want to arrange a courier, please state this on the form and we will contact you with a suitable time for collection.

If you are applying online, you must pay your fee online as part of your application.

If you are applying by post or courier, you can choose how to pay your application fee:

• By cheque in sterling on a UK bank account. The application form will tell you who to make the cheque payable to, you should write your full name and date of birth on the back, and attach the cheque to the front of the completed application form. 
• With a UK postal order. You should write your full name and date of birth on the back, and attach the postal order to the front of the completed application form. 
• With a credit or debit card - American Express, MasterCard, Visa (including Electron), Delta or Maestro (including Solo). For postal and courier payments, we accept only Maestro cards issued in the UK. You must include the card number, the amount paid, the payer's name as it appears on the card, the 'valid from' and expiry dates, the card verification value (CVV) code, the cardholder's signature and the date. The issue number is also needed for Maestro cards.

If you are applying and paying in person at a public enquiry office, you can choose how to pay your application fee:

• With a UK postal order (except at our Glasgow and Cardiff offices). You should write your full name and date of birth on the back.
• By banker's draft (except at our Glasgow and Cardiff offices). 
• With a credit or debit card - American Express, MasterCard, Visa (including Electron), Delta or Maestro (including Solo). We can accept any Maestro card for payments at a public enquiry office. You must include the card number, the amount paid, the payer's name as it appears on the card, the 'valid from' and expiry dates, the card verification value (CVV) code, the cardholder's signature and the date. The issue number is also needed for Maestro cards. The cardholder must be present for the payment to be taken.

Payment by any other method is not accepted.

You must send the full amount to cover the total cost of your application. If you do not do this, your application will be invalid and will not be considered. We will return your application and part payment to you.

We start considering the application when the payment has cleared. Payments are cleared:

• after 5 working days for cheques
• after 1 working day for credit or debit cards
• immediately for postal orders

Please note that, if you are making numerous payments using your credit card, the anti-fraud measures that banks operate sometimes stop payment being taken. This may be because you have exceeded the maximum limit on a single transaction or the number of transactions allowed in a given period of time. You must ensure that you contact your bank in advance, so that the bank will allow the full payment to be taken without any problems when you submit your applications.

Payment information on the application form

It is very important that you complete the payment section of the application form correctly. If this section contains errors, we will not be able to process your payment. This will mean that your application is invalid.