Do right to work checks apply to contractors from 1 October 2026?

Section 48 of the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025 inserts new provisions into the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006. The Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025 (Commencement No. 4) Regulations 2026 bring section 48 into force on 1 October 2026.

The Immigration (Restrictions on Employment and Residential Accommodation) (Prescribed Requirements and Codes of Practice) (Amendment) Regulations 2026 make connected changes and identify the revised code. The Home Office has also published an employer guide designed to apply from 1 October 2026 and revised discrimination material.

As at 30 August 2026, the existing employee regime remains in force. The new statutory scope has been enacted and its commencement fixed, but businesses implementing the detail should verify the final published guide and codes at the commencement date. A proposal, enacted provision, commencement instrument and operational guide perform different legal functions.

The amended framework treats references to employing an individual as including 4 principal categories: a contract of employment, a worker's contract, engagement as an individual subcontractor and an online matching service which provides the details of an individual service provider to potential clients or customers.

A worker's contract is not determined by the title printed on the agreement. The published material describes a contract, other than a contract of service or apprenticeship, under which an individual undertakes to perform work or services personally and the recipient is not the client or customer of a profession or business undertaking carried on by that individual.

The Home Office examples include an employment business engaging temporary hospitality workers under contracts for services, a delivery platform engaging individuals paid per delivery and a matching service connecting a cleaner personally with a customer. In each example, the identified business is treated as the employer for right to work purposes.

The first task is therefore classification under the amended immigration legislation. Employment status for tax, employment rights or contractual drafting may be relevant evidence, but it does not replace the statutory right to work definition.

The statutory question is not whether a supplier's personnel enter the customer's premises. It is whether the contractual structure falls within the extended provisions and who is responsible for providing or arranging the relevant work or services onwards.

The Home Office guide contrasts a logistics company contractually responsible for delivering warehousing services to a retailer, which then outsources the work, with the retailer merely purchasing those services for its own operations. On the published example, the logistics company may be within extended liability while the retailer is not.

The guide also distinguishes the supply of finished goods from a contract to provide work or services. A food producer using temporary labour to manufacture sandwiches for sale is not brought into extended liability merely because the retailer purchases the finished product. The employment business remains responsible for the workers it directly engages.

These examples assist but do not determine every commercial model. Mixed agreements, managed services, facilities contracts, franchises and arrangements combining goods with substantial labour require analysis of the obligations actually undertaken and how they operate in practice.

A direct employer ordinarily establishes a statutory excuse by completing the prescribed right to work check before the individual starts and any required follow up check. The permitted method depends upon the individual's status and evidence: a Home Office online check, a prescribed manual document check, a qualifying digital verification service or the Employer Checking Service in the circumstances covered by the guidance.

An upstream party facing extended liability requires a different evidence architecture. The published guide identifies contractual terms, substitution controls and identity verification as the 3 principal requirements. They must be implemented before the work begins and evidenced if the Home Office asks.

The proposed written terms include requirements for the direct engager to conduct prescribed checks, controls on further subcontracting, audit rights, enforcement action and cooperation with a Home Office investigation. The guide allows reliance upon assurances only where reasonable steps have been taken to establish that the assurances are reliable and the requirements operate in practice.

The commercial contract therefore matters, but contractual drafting alone is insufficient. Audit records, assurance evidence, compliance reviews and the response to identified concerns can determine whether the paper allocation was real.

Where an agreement permits substitution, the person who contracted may not be the person who arrives to perform the work. The new provisions respond to that gap by connecting right to work responsibility to the individual who personally provides the service.

The published guide requires a prescribed check on any substitute before they begin, prevents the check from being delegated to the original worker and requires the engager to maintain systems which link the person working to the identity which was checked. Records should show the authorised substitution, the period worked and the identity controls used.

A contractual prohibition on substitution does not remove the need to consider impersonation or an unauthorised substitution in practice. Conversely, a genuine substitution clause cannot be managed merely by requiring the original contractor to promise that any substitute has permission. The engager must establish the control specified for its own statutory position.

A sponsor licence holder must already check and retain evidence of immigration status for each sponsored worker, irrespective of whether the arrangement is within the statutory right to work scheme. The 1 October expansion does not replace those sponsor duties.

Where a sponsor also employs or engages an individual within the expanded scheme, it should complete the prescribed check needed for a statutory excuse. A sponsor record retained for immigration compliance, an application document or a check performed for another regulatory purpose is not automatically a prescribed right to work check.

Illegal working enforcement can affect the sponsor licence. The published guide records possible consequences including civil penalties of up to £60,000 per illegal worker, criminal sanction in serious cases, business closure, director disqualification and loss of the ability to sponsor migrants. A contractor review should therefore sit within the wider sponsor risk framework where the organisation holds a licence.

List every individual who may perform work from 1 October 2026 outside a conventional employee relationship. Record the contracting entities, the work promised, who selects and pays the individual, whether personal performance is required, whether substitution is permitted and whether an online service or intermediary is involved.

Classify the direct employer and any party potentially within extended liability. Then assign the correct pre commencement controls: prescribed individual checks, written contractual requirements, approval of further subcontracting, audit access, substitution controls, identity verification, follow up checks and retention of evidence.

The process must also avoid unlawful discrimination. Checks should be applied consistently to British, Irish and other workers within the relevant population. A business should not select individuals for additional scrutiny because of nationality, accent, name or perceived immigration status.

1. 01
   People

   Identify employees, worker contracts, individual subcontractors and people sourced through matching services.

2. 02
   Contracts

   Map every entity, service obligation, labour provider, subcontracting tier and substitution right.

3. 03
   Responsibility

   Identify the direct engager and each party potentially exposed through extended liability.

4. 04
   Checks

   Apply the prescribed individual check before work begins and programme any required repeat check.

5. 05
   Assurance

   Build written terms, audit rights, reliable supplier assurance and enforcement mechanisms.

6. 06
   Identity

   Confirm that the individual working is the same person whose right to work was checked.

7. 07
   Evidence

   Retain contracts, checks, audits, substitution records and action taken on concerns.

8. 08
   Equality

   Apply the process consistently without assumptions based upon nationality or perceived origin.

Businesses are most exposed where an agreement presents a clean supplier relationship but site managers allocate shifts, workers substitute informally, several intermediaries are involved or no one can identify which entity engaged the person. Those facts weaken both classification and evidence of a functioning control system.

The solution is not to convert every supplier into an employee or to perform indiscriminate duplicate checks across every tier. It is to identify the party responsible for each statutory task, reserve the necessary rights and prove that those rights were exercised in a reasonable and proportionate way.

A defensible system should allow the business to answer 4 questions quickly: who performed the work, who engaged them, what check or assurance applied before they began, and where the evidence is retained. If the organisation cannot answer those questions, contractual labels offer limited protection.