STAFFORD — An employment tribunal in May ordered Swan Care Solutions Ltd to pay Shabin Shaji £28,843.54 in unpaid wages and holiday pay, plus additional remedy for failing to provide him a written contract or follow grievance procedures. The tribunal also ordered the company to pay £8,700 in costs.
Shabin Shaji, a 33-year-old Indian citizen and computer science graduate with prior healthcare experience in India, came to the UK in 2023 under the post-Brexit skilled worker visa scheme after securing a certificate of sponsorship from Swan Care Solutions. He relocated from Kerala to Stafford, England, believing there was a major shortage of healthcare workers and that he would begin employment immediately.
However, Swan Care Solutions did not assign Shaji any shifts for a year despite his repeated requests, according to tribunal findings. Employment judge Kate Edmonds stated: "The claimant had done what needed to be done to start work. He was now in the country, with the right permissions, and living in the right location. However, the respondent did not provide him with work, nor did they pay him." Edmonds added: "What in effect the respondent was doing, was treating the claimant as a zero-hours worker. The problem, of course, was that the claimant was not a zero-hours worker." She also said: "The respondent withheld work from him. There was therefore an unauthorised deduction from his wages."
Shaji’s sponsored visa restricted him from working more than 20 hours per week for another employer, leaving him unable to seek alternative full-time work. He told the tribunal that Swan Care Solutions’ actions had "serious long-term detrimental effects on my personal and family finances." During the year without income, he survived on charity, drinking tap water, buying discounted bread, and accepting snacks from churchgoers. "I was broke and had to rely on charity. I drank tap water and bought bread close to its expiration date to survive and looked around local shops in Stafford for free bananas and bread for those who were struggling," Shaji said. "I attended church and on Sundays after worship, the good people who attend the worship shared with me some snacks with tea, for which I am very grateful." He added: "I thought it would be a great opportunity, but when I came to the UK I found immigrants and British people struggling. I was in a terrible situation, feeling like no one in authority cared if I lived or died."
Swan Care Solutions’ staff advised Shaji to take cash-in-hand jobs and use a food bank, telling him they would contact him when it was his "turn." The company’s license to issue certificates of sponsorship was revoked in 2024, partly because it withheld pay until training completion. Shaji secured sponsorship from another employer in April 2024 and later returned to India in ill health.
Dora-Olivia Vicol, chief executive of the Work Rights Centre—which assisted Shaji—said: "We’ve seen case after case of migrant care workers sold a dream in Britain, leaving their careers and families behind, only to find destitution and abandonment by their employer and the state." She added: "The skilled worker visa must be entirely reformed to make it easier to change employers when rights or contracts are breached."