How to increase your CoS allocation: timings, the priority route and the renewal trap

If your undefined Certificate of Sponsorship allocation runs out part way through the year, you can ask the Home Office for more through the sponsorship management system (SMS). GOV.UK says a standard request is usually decided within 12 weeks. An A-rated sponsor can pay £350 to have it considered within five working days instead, but only if it secures one of the limited daily slots.

Twelve weeks is close to a quarter of the year, and if your allocation has run dry, no worker who needs an undefined certificate can be sponsored in that time. For an employer extending visas and hiring people already in the UK every month, that is a recruitment plan on hold. This guide from Borderless Immigration sets out how the allocation works, how to request more and what the caseworker weighs, when the priority route is worth it, and the renewal rule that shrinks next year's allocation if this year was quiet.

What the allocation covers, and what it does not

There are two kinds of Certificate of Sponsorship (CoS). Defined certificates are for Skilled Workers applying for a visa from outside the UK. Undefined certificates are for Skilled Workers applying from inside the UK, which covers extensions and switches from another route, and for workers on every other sponsored route (sponsor guidance Part 2, S2.8). Our guide to defined and undefined certificates covers the difference in more depth.

Only undefined certificates come from an allocation. You assign them from your annual allocation (S2.9), and you cannot hold an annual allocation of defined certificates: you apply for one each time you need it (S2.10), and GOV.UK says those applications are usually approved within one working day. So an allocation shortfall bites on your in-country hires and extensions, not on overseas recruitment.

Getting this wrong is expensive in a different way. The Home Office will normally revoke a licence that assigns an undefined certificate where a defined one was required (S2.11), so running short of undefined certificates is never a reason to use the wrong type.

How long each route takes

The priority clock is easy to misread. Pay on a Monday and the five working days start on Tuesday, and a complex request can run beyond them, in which case the Home Office writes to the authorising officer.

Your CoS year and why unused certificates disappear

Your allocation lasts for a CoS year, sometimes called an allocation year. For most sponsors it runs for 12 months from the date the licence was granted and, in later years, for 12 months from the date an allocation renewal request is granted. Sponsors whose Tier 2 licence converted on 1 December 2020 and whose renewal is automated run from 6 April to 5 April instead (S2.20).

Certificates you have not assigned by the end of the CoS year are removed from your SMS account, and you cannot carry them over (S2.23). An allocation is a budget for a year, not a bank, which is why the request you make should be sized to the hiring you can see rather than padded for comfort.

How to request more certificates in the SMS

The steps are in guide 7 of the Home Office's SMS manual 2, Manage your sponsorship licence. A Level 1 User does it from the licence summary screen.

1. From Licence summary, applications and services, select Request CoS/CAS allocation increase.
2. Select Add a request next to the route you want to increase. You can increase more than one route on the same request.
3. Enter the number of certificates you need and the reasons for the request, which the manual says must be explained in full, then select Save.
4. Check the number and the reasons, edit them if you need to, then select Submit.

Once a request is submitted you can withdraw it while it is still outstanding, but you cannot edit it, so the reasons need to be right before you press Submit. You can make an increase request as many times as you need during the allocation year. If the SMS will not let you add a request, the manual says your allocation may have expired and you may need to renew it instead.

An allocation set to zero can be increased in the same way (S2.22). That matters after a restructure. If a partial takeover or de-merger leaves you with no sponsored workers and you keep the licence, the Home Office reduces your allocation to zero (Part 3, C4.19), and it does the same if you still have workers but are unsure whether or when you will recruit (C4.21). On the other side of a deal, a sponsor taking on workers in a complete takeover or merger (C4.15), or as the new sponsor in a partial takeover (C4.22), can use the SMS to apply for an increase if it may need to recruit more. Our guide to a sponsor licence change of ownership covers the reporting side.

What the caseworker weighs, and how to write the reasons

Part 2 says you must give reasons for an increase and that the Home Office may ask for evidence (S2.22). It lists factors it can consider when it sets an allocation, which include, but are not limited to, your record of dealing with the Home Office, the agents you use to recruit and whether they have been linked to immigration abuse, the number of workers you employ, the kind and extent of your business, and how long you have been trading (S2.18).

It also gives a non-exhaustive list of reasons it may allocate fewer certificates than you asked for, or none: a history of non-compliance, insufficient justification for the number requested, a need that is not credible on your current circumstances, doubt that you can offer work meeting the definition of an eligible role (including salary and skill level), and uncertainty on your part about whether or when you will need to recruit (S2.19). That list is the best guide to what a well-made request answers. Before you submit, check that your reasons cover each of these.

• How many certificates you need, for which route, and over what period of the CoS year.
• Which roles they are for, with the occupation codes and salaries, so the caseworker can see they are eligible roles.
• Why the need is real now: named start dates, visa expiry dates for extensions, contracts won, or sites opening.
• How many you have assigned so far this year and how many remain, so the shortfall adds up.
• Anything about your circumstances that has changed since the allocation was set, such as growth, a takeover, or a new site.

Neither Part 2 nor the SMS manual lists the documents the Home Office may ask for, so keep whatever supports each line of your reasons ready to send. The guidance is clear that the number is discretionary, and the request is the only place you get to make the case.

If you are a care provider, our guide to requesting Certificates of Sponsorship covers how providers have prepared these requests.

The priority route: when £350 is worth it

The Home Office's priority change of circumstance service covers additional and annual allocation requests along with eight other licence changes. It has conditions that catch sponsors out.

• Your licence must be A-rated and fully active.
• You must submit the request in the SMS first, and it must not yet be in progress or allocated to a caseworker.
• It is for undefined certificates only. A priority request for defined certificates is rejected and the fee is not refunded.
• Requests are emailed with the priority request form between 7am and 5pm, Monday to Friday. Anything sent outside those hours is not considered.
• At least 120 requests are accepted each day, and any change to that limit is posted on the SMS message board.
• If you are accepted, you have 72 hours from the payment email to pay, weekends included, or the request expires.

If you hear nothing, the guidance tells you to assume the request was not successful. The fee buys consideration within five working days, not approval. Our guide to the post licence priority service walks through the email format, the payment window, and the preparation failures that end a request early.

Whether it is worth it depends on what the shortfall is blocking. If a worker's visa expires in a month and you have no undefined certificate to assign for the extension, five working days for £350 is cheap. If the shortfall is three months out, a standard request made today should usually land in time.

The certificates still have to be paid for once you assign them. Each Skilled Worker certificate costs £525 on assignment, and you may also owe the Immigration Skills Charge. GOV.UK's certificates page lists those fees and the priority option, and does not list a fee for a standard allocation request.

Work out the cost of each new certificate with the visa fees calculator

Plan the request before you need it

The 12-week figure turns allocation into a forecasting problem. Count backwards from the hires you can already see, not forwards from the day the SMS says you have none left.

Take a sponsor with an annual allocation of 40 undefined certificates and a CoS year starting on 1 April. By 1 November it has assigned 31, leaving nine. Between November and March it expects 14 in-country hires and visa extensions, so it will be five short. A standard request submitted on 1 November would usually be decided by late January, while the nine remaining certificates cover November to January. Submitted on 1 February instead, the same request would usually not be decided until late April, by which time the CoS year has ended and the March hires have had nothing to draw on.

The renewal trap: a quiet year shrinks the next one

At the end of each CoS year you either receive an automatic allocation or make a manual request for a follow-on allocation (S2.24). You get the automatic one only if your licence is A-rated, your current allocation is marked as active in the SMS, and you are licensed on an eligible route (S2.25). Seasonal Worker, Secondment Worker, Service Supplier, and UK Expansion Worker are excluded (S2.26), and on the Skilled Worker route only undefined certificates renew automatically (S2.28).

The automatic allocation equals the number of certificates you assigned in the previous CoS year, not the number you were given. SMS manual 2 says the Home Office writes to you if automation has been granted, and that if you receive an email reminding you to apply, you must submit a manual request. The guidance's own example: an allocation of 15, of which you assigned 10, renews at 10 (S2.27). A sponsor that had a slow year, or front-loaded its hiring into the previous year, starts the new year with less headroom than it had, and needs a manual increase request for anything more.

If you need a manual renewal, you can submit it up to three months before the end of your CoS year (S2.29). The SMS manual is plain about what happens if you miss it: the allocation expires, and although you can still apply afterwards, you cannot assign certificates until the request has been considered and granted. For an employer with extensions falling due every week, that gap lands straight on the workers whose permission is running out.

Be accurate in the request as well, because giving false information in a request to renew your annual allocation is on the Part 3 list of circumstances in which the Home Office will revoke a licence (Annex C1, item r).

What can take allocation away

The Home Office may reduce an allocation or set it to zero if your circumstances change, for example if you downsize or it takes compliance action against you (S2.21). Reducing an allocation or setting it to zero is also the first sanction listed in Part 3 when it suspects you are not meeting your sponsor duties (C1.12). A licence downgraded to a B rating can only assign a certificate to a worker applying from inside the UK on the same route as their last grant, where you assigned the certificate behind that grant and are continuing to sponsor them (Part 2, S3.3), and it is no longer eligible for the priority service or automatic renewal. A suspended licence cannot assign any certificates at all (S3.4). Keeping the A-rating protects your allocation as much as your reputation.

Allocation is the part of a sponsor licence that looks administrative and behaves like a budget. The employers who rarely need the priority route are the ones who know, every month, how many certificates they have, how many they will need, and when their CoS year ends. The rule itself is simple; keeping the numbers current across dozens of hires is the work, and there's just too much at stake to find out the hard way.

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Paragraph references are to the Workers and Temporary Workers guidance for sponsors, Part 2 version 10/26 (valid from 8 October 2026) and Part 3 version 08/26 (valid from 28 August 2026). Timings and fees are from the GOV.UK pages on Certificates of sponsorship and the Worker and Temporary Worker priority change of circumstance service (updated 27 April 2026), and the SMS steps from SMS manual 2 (updated 11 September 2026). All were read on 11 November 2026. The worked example above is illustrative rather than drawn from a real sponsor.