For TCS, Infosys and Wipro, sending employees to the UK will be a costly affair!

Already hit by new US visa rules, the Indian IT companies may have to suffer another soft blow.

The UK is considering increasing minimum salary of IT employees entering the country, a move that increase costs to companies and will check migration.

UK, which is the second largest market for Indian IT companies, wants to increase the minimum salary to £ 41,500.

The proposal by UK's Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) is likely to have a combined impact of £1,200 per applicant per year.

Indian IT companies enter UK through tier-2 visas and companies like TCS, Infosys, Wipro make use of intra-company transfer visas.

However, the proposal did not go well with NASSCOM as UK wants to lower down annual net migration to the tens of thousands (from the current level of 336,000).

"We are disappointed that companies leveraging Indian talent in information technology domain are singled out in the report. The UK and India enjoy strong trading relationships: the commitment to increase trade was renewed when Prime Minister Modi visited the UK in 2015," said Nasscom president R Chandrashekhar.

MAC report stated that in 2014, tier-2 visas accounted for an inflow of 52,478 people into the UK.

To reduce migration through the tier-2 route, "price should be the main mechanism" and higher costs would likely reduce demand, according to MAC.

Chandrashekhar said the report does not have evidence that a rise in costs would cut migration or raise availability of skilled workers in the UK.

(Image: Indiatimes)