Director
Languages spoken
English | Cantonese
May Cheung is a director who specialises in UK business immigration law in our Labour & Employment team. She is based in the London office and advises corporate organisations on UK immigration and compliance matters. This includes both sponsorship compliance and prevention of illegal working issues. May provides immigration input on corporate transactions involving sponsored workers or right-to-work challenge. She also audits clients’ records, systems and processes in preparation for UKVI audits and delivers training sessions on regular changes.
She has been listed in Legal 500 since 2019 and clients find her “excellent in terms of communication, attention to detail and knowledge sharing”. May is also listed as “Up and Coming” in Chambers and Partners 2025 – 2026 edition, following feedback from clients that:
“May provides an outstanding service and advises on a wide range of complex immigration matters”.
“We have found May to be very knowledgeable, proactive and responsive”.
“May is very knowledgeable and clearly an expert in the field of immigration”.
May has a particular interest in immigration law changes and regularly contributes to the UK government and Migration Advisory Committee’s consultations on temporary shortage roles, the Earned Settlement Scheme proposals and liaises with Home Office policy teams to ensure the law, such as changes from the Immigration White Paper in July 2025, remains practical and relevant to businesses.
She is also co-author (with Annabel Mace) in Brightmine (previously known as Xpert HR) publication updates and presents on their webinars to their members on immigration law updates.
Advising a multinational group with an internal restructure and transfer of sponsored workers to two other entities so that they can continue to work in the UK legally. The workers included senior executives and key skilled members of the group, so it was vital to ensure their employment and immigration status was transferred appropriately within the tight deadlines to avoid impact on their stay and ability to work in the UK for the client.
Assisted a listed US company who were establishing a subsidiary in the UK to obtain an expansion worker licence within weeks to allow a senior executive to enter to complete a deal worth £500million.
Prepared a client onsite for a UKVI audit on short notice within three days, to ensure the business was compliant with Home Office requirements which avoided any ramifications to the sponsor licence and their key workers.
Represent clients with responses to the Immigration Enforcement teams on information requests for suspected illegal workers to alleviate or wholly avoid the £60,000 per worker civil penalty fine which would also result in reputational damage to clients and possible impact on stock prices
Successfully assisted corporate clients with achieving positive outcomes to complex cases where their employees’ visas may have been issued incorrectly under the wrong category, unknowingly expired or workers have accidently breached immigration conditions.
Member, Immigration Legal Practitioner Association