owend

God this process is a nightmare, the only thing I can liken it to is being pregnant, where 9 months feels like a lifetime!!

No news on OH today, will be patient and give it another couple of days.

memewest - can I ask how come you've sent off for your PCCs already (police checks if I understand correctly!). My understanding was that you - lodge the visa.. then they request PCC and Medicals....? sorry if this is on the wrong thread.

JenniGee

I think I ran out of favours with George (HWMBO) Lombard when I sent him the Mills & Boon epic that was my Defacto Statement to read over.... not heard a word from him since, so daren't ask him to pootle off to the Post Office for us

You'll be fine Stellaman I'm sure - when did you post those documents again - you did send them via a decent carrier this time, didn't you

Good luck to all those waiting

chasmw

I'm "With Assessor" and have a registered post number now as well.

Greetings from Perth btw - it's everything we hoped it would be! Another week of our holiday to go.....don't want it to end.

tiger222

Chasmw - Woo Hoo!! Congratulations!! Soon you won't have to have your "vacation" end - it will become your "every day" experience. ( What a lovely thought. )

Mairead

Thats exactly what I used to say!!!!

You can upload both your Pcc's and meds to your application before you are asked for them by your CO. I applied for my PCC's in December 07 however we didn't get our ACS result until feb 08. Trouble with front loading is they are both only valid for one year so I will be required to be in Australia by Dec 09. That suits me but the short timeframe may not be everyone's cup of tea!!


Well done on getting the RPL done!!! Hopefully your status will change this week.


Congratulations!!!! It took our letter only 5 days to arrive from going to with assessor.

memewest

Hi Owend

We're going to frontload our police checks with our visa app and try to sort out the medicals as soon after we have done the visa app. We sent for our police checks the same day we sent our ACS off and we haven't recieved them back yet....also, they are bringing in a new PCC soon, don't know quite when, which from what i understand are only valid for 6 months and cost £35 instead of the £10 i have paid, so wanted to get them done before that comes into place.... we're quite happy to go on a validation holiday and come back, we have a house to sell which isn't going on the market until we actually have our visa...

Hopefully you'll get some news on your OH soon....and the way things are going, we're hoping to get 'With Accessor' pretty soon...

Here's impatiently waiting.....

benlast

Ah, that gives me some hope - my ACS was received 07-02 and is still In Process, but if it's anything like that timeline it shouldn't be long. Time to book the IELTS test.

Just got back from Perth as well: it was definitely the right thing (for us) to do a reccie trip. I spent some time talking to a very helpful guy who runs an IT recruitment and software development company, finding out how the IT world ticks out there. Chasmw - I think you were going to do the same?

The only downside of the trip was being without Internet access for two weeks (the family we stayed with don't have broadband hooked up yet). It's amazing how often we'd be discussing some aspect of migrating and think "ah, someone mentioned that on British Expats"... and then we had no way to look it up!

Cheers
b

rushmere

The new police checks do cost £35, but you get them processed within 10 days instead of 40 days. You can get them processed within 2 days if you cough up £70. The checks were originally valid for 6 months, but that limitation seems to have been removed now.

tiger222

Rushmere -

I didn't know you could apply for State Sponsorship prior to getting skills assessed? Congratulations on that part!

rushmere

Thanks

Yes, you don't have to wait for the skills assessment before applying for sponsorship. Applying for sponsorship is free, so if you need the extra points, it's worth seeing if you can get sponsorship before paying for a skills assessment.

WithIce

Hi, we're heading to Melbourne and probably not for a year or so, we're taking it nice and slow as we're still recovering form our original move of UK to NZ. When do you go?

Yes he's a Java programmer with a good few years of experience. Have you managed to get an idea of pay ranges for this kind of work yet?

WithIce x

PS Sorry for the late reply, put the computer keeps going on the fritz!

tiger222

Check out this website for pay range

http://www.ambit.com.au/salarysurvey/it&t.html

How do those salaries compare to NZ?

WithIce

Looking at that link, there doesn't seem to be much in it salary wise, although anectdotally we have been told he will earn more. Also with taxes and more choice in consumer goods we are expecting to be better off. I guess we'll see .....

Sorry slightly OT!

WithIce x

Off 2 Oz

"With Assessor" today, shouldn't be too long now, hurray!!

owend

Hi - thanks for the info on PCCs. I read the form and decided I should get my skates on!