Visiting to do Business

If you want to do business in the UK, you should apply to come here as a business visitor if you are one of the following:

• Film crew
• Representative of overseas news media
• Academic visitor
• Visiting professor accompanying students on a study abroad programme
• Religious worker
• Adviser, consultant, trainer or trouble shooter
• Person undertaking specific, one-off training
• Secondee from an overseas company
• Doctor undertaking a clinical attachment, or dentist undertaking a clinical observer post
• Doctor taking the Professional and Linguistic Assessment Board (PLAB) test.
• attending meetings (including interviews that have been arranged before you come to the UK) or conferences;
• arranging deals, or negotiating or signing trade agreements or contracts;
• undertaking fact-finding missions;
• conducting site visits;
• accompanying a tour group as a tour group courier, provided you are contracted to a firm outside the UK, and you intend to leave with that tour group;
• speaking at a 'one-off' conference where this is not run as a commercial concern;
• representing a foreign  businessmen
• interpreting or translating for visiting business persons, provided you are employed by the overseas company and are coming solely to provide this service for the visiting company member;
• acting as a monteur (a worker such as a fitter or serviceperson) for up to 6 months to erect, dismantle, install, service, repair or advise on the development of foreign-made machinery;
• attending board meetings in the UK as a board-level director, provided you are not employed by a UK company (although you may be paid a fee for attending the meeting); and
• representing a computer software company by coming to install, debug or enhance their products. You may also come here as a business visitor to be briefed about a UK customer's requirements - but if you use your expertise to make a detailed assessment of a potential customer's requirements, we will regard this as consultancy work, for which you will need a visa under the points-based system.

Requirements

To come to the UK as a business visitor, you must be able to show that:

• you are 18 or over;
• you intend to visit the UK for no more than 6 months (or 12 months if you are an academic visitor), unless you are a doctor taking the PLAB test (in which case you can apply to extend your stay and undertake a clinical attachment if you pass the PLAB test);
• you intend to leave the UK at the end of your visit;
• you have enough money to support and accommodate yourself without working or help from public funds, or you and any dependents will be supported and accommodated by relatives or friends;
• you are based abroad and do not intend to transfer your base to the UK, even temporarily;
• you receive your salary from abroad (although it is acceptable for you to receive reasonable travel and subsistence expenses while you are in the UK);
• not be replacing someone in the UK, including for temporary leave periods;
• you can meet the cost of the return or onward journey; and
• you are not in transit to a country outside the 'Common Travel Area' (Ireland, the UK, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands).

You must also be able to show that, during your visit, you do not intend to:

• take paid or unpaid employment, produce goods or provide services, including the selling of goods or services directly to members of the public;
• do a course of study;
• marry or register a civil partnership, or give notice of marriage or civil partnership; or
• receive private medical treatment.