Checklist: Skilled Worker visa documents

Most of a Skilled Worker file arrives in English from your sponsor. The Turkish part is smaller than people expect, and the item that catches applicants out is not the diploma — it is the criminal record certificate and the order in which it has to be handled.

Who this list is for

Turkish citizens holding a Certificate of Sponsorship from a UK employer, applying from Türkiye or switching inside the UK, together with partners and children applying at the same time. It assumes your sponsor has confirmed the salary and occupation code; that judgement is theirs, not ours.

The documents

• Certificate of Sponsorship reference number — issued in English by the sponsor. Nothing to translate.
• Passport — the biodata page is in the Latin alphabet; no translation. Older Turkish passports with handwritten endorsements occasionally need a note, which we add without charge.
• Criminal record certificate (adli sicil kaydı) — required for certain health, education and social-care occupations and for partners aged 18 and over. Take the version issued for use abroad, apostille it first (adli sicil can be e-apostilled through e-Devlet at no cost), then translate. Certificates are expected to be recent, so order it close to the application date.
• Degree certificate and transcript (diploma, transkript) — only where the sponsor or the occupation requires the qualification to be evidenced. Translation into English required; grades are reproduced as they appear, never converted.
• Bank statement (banka hesap dökümü) — needed for maintenance funds unless the sponsor certifies maintenance on the CoS. If the account is Turkish, every page is translated.
• Partner and children — marriage certificate, vukuatlı registry extract and birth certificates, all translated.
• TB test certificate and ATAS clearance — issued in English by the approved clinic and by the FCDO respectively. No translation.
• Employment reference from a Turkish employer (çalışma belgesi) — not a route requirement, but sponsors often ask for it during recruitment. Translation required if they do.

What people most often get wrong

The sequence around the adli sicil is the big one: translate first and apostille afterwards and the apostille sits on the wrong document, because it certifies the Turkish original's signature, not our English text. The second is scope — applicants send a full academic file when the sponsor has already assessed the qualification and nobody will read it. The third is timing: a certificate ordered months before submission looks stale next to a recent application, and re-ordering from abroad takes longer than translating.

What we would translate and what it would cost

A typical worker plus spouse: adli sicil for each of you (1 page each), a marriage certificate (1 page), a vukuatlı registry extract (2 pages) and three months of Turkish bank statements (3 pages). Nine pages at £10.00 is £90.00, certification included, no UK VAT, PDF within one to two working days. If the certificates are not already e-apostilled, our Ankara apostille service is £15 per document and adds one to three days. Fast delivery takes the translation to £144.00; economy drops it to £72.00.

Before you rely on this list

Treat this as a packing aid, not as immigration advice. Which occupations require an overseas criminal record certificate, and the salary and skill thresholds behind your CoS, are set by the Home Office and were changed as recently as July 2025; the current position is on the route page at gov.uk, and your sponsor's guidance sits above anything written here.