Cryoslider

Hi , my wife is a kiwi and we are going through the process of the visa application, the visa was lodged with NZ immigration on 5th Oct and just today got a letter back saying the visa was being processed and had been sent to Manakau for centralised processing (new since April this year) I'm told it will get allocated to an immigration officer in 2 to 3 months, my problem is my flight is booked for march 12th, (I know I shouldn't have booked but the flight was only £390 with Thai airways) my question is shall I just still fly out even if my visa hasn't come through yet?, can I still receive it whilst I'm in NZ ? I'm hoping it will come through in time but not sure, I don't want to miss that flight as my wife and son are flying out in Feb! Any advice and thoughts would be great, thanks.

MrsFychan

if it doesn't come through by then you would need to get an onward flight out of NZ or they will not let you board the plane if you have a one way ticket, and not a valid visa in the passport.
Once you have be allocated a Case Officer it can take up to 4 months on average to process the application.

Cryoslider

Hi thanks for the info, The flight I have in March has a return leg on it at the end of April so on that front I'm ok.......unless of course the visa doesn't come through by then, in which case I will change the return flight date. I'm really hoping it won't be another 4 months after it's been allocated to an immigration officer, that will mean the whole process would have taken over 7 months which is well past the 3 - 4 months it seems on average other people are taking, both my wife and son are NZ citizens and all the evidence we submitted has been accepted so it should all be straight forward and plain sailing I would have though!

MrsFychan

Yes but it's all about priority and those with job offers will be first in line. You may well have a job to go to but your application is for partnership visa so had less priority hence the longer time frame of on average 4 months from gaining a case officer

escapedtonz

Nope.
Resident Visa processing priority is highest for family stream applications, so those applications that are related to dependents and partnership etc and where the applications are supported by family/partners who are already NZ Citizens or hold a Resident Class Visa for the minimum qualifying period.
The reasons why the OP is delayed will just be a workload thing or a timing issue most probably. Immigration had thousands of applications through for the Silver Fern Visa on the 3rd November so they will have another 300 of those to process.
After the family stream, next priority for Resident Class visas then goes to those with job offers and then bottom of the list is applications without job offers.

MrsFychan

looks like they have updated the processing time lines:

https://www.immigration.govt.nz/abou...sa-application

So yes escapetonz is correct. average for partnership is 4months from date of allocated a case officer.

can't believe Skilled migrant has gone up to 6 months

Cryoslider

Hiya, is that really from the time it is allocated to a case officer? Isn't it from the time the application is lodged with NZ immigration? My initial application was sent at the beginning of Sep and was allocated to a case officer within a few days but sent back to me within a week as I only submitted a police cert from the UK not Sweden (I have a Swedish passport). I returned the completed application beginning of Oct and as yet have not been allocated a case officer but all must be ok as they have returned all the supporting docs to me and sent my certified copy of my passport to NZ for processing. I guess I just have to be patient but will get nervous if I hear nothing by the end of Feb!

MrsFychan

I believe it would go back to the same Case Officer, but thats just my belief. If anything in the process is amiss the whole process is stopped until that piece of evidence is either sent in and approved or the application is denied. They do not proceed with the process whilst awaiting any requested further information as this may just lead to them doing work that in the end is not required if the requested documentation is incorrect. The fact that they have requested further documentation from you means that the 4months average time line is now negated as you did not supply all the necessary documentation, the onus being that you check and double check that you do before sending in.

I know our case officer only worked 3 days a week and coming up to Christmas things also slowed. In NZ most things really slow down xmas eve until early February when the kids go back to school.