A series of O-(o- and p-azido)benzyl thiocarbamates smoothly rearranged in the course of Staudinger imination reactions with tertiary phosphines, giving rise to the respective S-(o- and p-phosphinimino)benzyl thiocarbamates as a result of an oxygen to Sulfur migration of the functionalized benzyl group. By contrary, their m-azido isomers did not rearrange under similar conditions. Computational investigations using DFT methods revealed the uncoupled concerted mechanisms of these 1,3-benzyl shifts via polar transition states with pseudopericyclic orbital topologies, with the benzyl group migrating in the plane of the thiocarbamate fragment. (c) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.