Private clients
Immigration advice for individuals, families and households where discretion is part of the instruction. Some clients cannot afford for an immigration matter to be visible. That might be because the name is recognised, because a diplomatic posting carries its own sensitivities, because the family office prefers everything to run through one channel, or simply because a private matter should stay private. We work on that basis as a matter of course, not as an add-on.
We have advised individuals whose names are publicly known, including performers, broadcasters, sportspeople and people with substantial public followings. We have acted on referral from a diplomatic mission, and for members of diplomatic households.
We act for individuals whose affairs are coordinated through their own family office or private bank, and for senior executives moving to the UK at the request of a board. Instructions can come through the office that already runs everything else.
We do not publish client names. We do not use client matters as case studies, anonymised or otherwise, unless the client has asked us to. If you want to know whether we have handled something close to your situation, ask us on a call and we will tell you what we can.
What discretion means here
Access to your file is limited to the solicitor conducting it and the supervising director, and nobody else needs to know the matter exists.
No directory entry, no award submission, no post on LinkedIn, no quiet mention at a conference.
Papers and identity documents are exchanged by secure transfer rather than as email attachments, and we hold what we need for as long as we are required to hold it, and no more.
We will take instructions through your private office, your assistant, your agent, your manager or your adviser where you prefer, once you have given us authority to deal with them.
Public figures, performers and creators
Most work routes assume an employer willing to sponsor you, and you may not have one. Income arrives from platforms, agencies, brands and several countries at once, in a shape that application forms are not built to read. And the people advising you on everything else often have no reason to know where the immigration lines fall.
The routes that usually do the work are Global Talent, where a career record carries the application rather than a job offer, the Creative Worker route for engagements and touring, and Innovator Founder where the business behind the profile is the real asset. Where the move is a personal one, the partner and family routes apply in the ordinary way.
What catches people out is narrower and more common than they expect. Coming to the UK as a visitor and then working while here, including content made and monetised from a London hotel room, is the one we are asked about most often, usually after the fact. Brand, agency and management arrangements that do not correspond to any sponsored category are close behind. So is evidencing self-employed income drawn from multiple platforms and currencies when the rules want payslips and a single employer.
We also advise the businesses that sit around the person, including management and production companies that need a sponsor licence of their own, and family offices dealing with household and personal staff.
An immigration application creates a record. Part of what we are doing is keeping that trail no wider than it has to be.
Sportspeople and coaches
Elite sport has its own route, and its own gatekeeper. Before the Home Office sees an International Sportsperson application at all, the relevant national governing body has to endorse it against criteria that body sets and revises for itself, sport by sport and season by season. That endorsement, not the visa, is where most of these applications are won or lost, and where an exceptions panel becomes the argument worth preparing properly.
The club or organisation also has to hold a sponsor licence and be in a position to assign a certificate. That is rarely a problem for an established club and frequently a problem for a newly promoted one, a new franchise, or an academy setting up in the UK for the first time.
Coaching and backroom appointments do not always sit in the same route as the athlete. Coaches, analysts, medical and performance staff can fall inside or outside the sportsperson provisions depending on the sport, the level and the role, and getting that call wrong costs a transfer window rather than a form.
Windows close, seasons start, and tournaments do not move. We would rather be involved while the deal is being discussed than on the afternoon it has to be registered.
Two things catch sportspeople later on. The first is competing or appearing in the UK as a visitor, where the line between what is permitted and what is not is finer than it looks. The second is settlement and citizenship, where the absences that come with an international competitive calendar have to be tracked from the first year, not reconstructed in the fifth.
We do not publish client names. We never have.
The Lawyery team
How we meet
Most of our clients never do. We are built to work this way, so it is not an accommodation we are making for you.
Consultations are online and are arranged around your diary rather than ours, including early mornings and evenings where the time difference requires it. Documents are signed electronically wherever the Home Office permits it. Where a wet signature or an original is genuinely needed, we arrange the courier.
If you would rather meet in person, we have meeting facilities at 3 Waterhouse Square in Holborn, by prior arrangement.
We do not otherwise travel to clients, and that is deliberate. Staying virtual is what allows a small senior team to conduct your matter directly rather than handing it down, and it is why the solicitor you instructed is the one who answers when you call.
What we advise on
Global Talent, Innovator Founder and the other routes open to founders and investors, including where the business behind a public profile is the real asset in the application.
Skilled Worker and Global Business Mobility transfers, including where the employing entity has yet to obtain a sponsor licence of its own.
International Sportsperson applications and the governing body endorsements that come first, for players, coaches and backroom staff.
Creative Worker applications and the visitor rules, including where a trip mixes permitted activity with work that is not permitted.
Partner, spouse and children's applications, including questions of schooling and sole responsibility.
Indefinite leave to remain and British citizenship, including the effect of absences from the UK on both.
Visit visa applications where the purpose of the trip needs explaining properly, and where a previous refusal makes the next application harder.
The immigration position of private and domestic staff, including for family offices running a UK household for the first time.
We take on matters carrying a refusal on the file, a travel or immigration history that needs handling carefully, or an application that was made without advice and now needs unpicking.
We give a clear view of what is likely, including when it is not what you were hoping to hear. What we cannot do, and nobody honestly can, is guarantee a Home Office decision.
Advisers and fees
We advise on immigration. We do not advise on tax, residence for tax purposes, or wealth structuring, and we will say so plainly when a question belongs with your accountants or tax counsel.
The two overlap more often than people expect, particularly around days spent in and out of the UK, and we would rather speak to your other advisers directly than have you carry information between us.
Most of our work is on a fixed fee agreed before we start, so you know the cost of the matter at the outset. Where a matter genuinely cannot be scoped in advance, we charge for time at a rate agreed with you first, and we tell you when the estimate needs to change before it changes.
Our published fees for the most common instructions are on our pricing page.
Your first conversation will be with Chris Dias or Crystal Dias, the firm's directors, not with an intake team. Book online, call +44 (0)20 3576 1275, or email info@lawyery.co and mark it private.
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