kateomaco

Hi All,
I'm new to the site & have been reading some of the threads and have come across some useful info! I'm wondering if anyone can help me...I'm Aussie living in UK & I've been with my fiance for just short of 4 years. We're planning on apply for the Partner Visa soon but it's just a matter of getting all the right documents together & forms filled out correctly etc. Even though we're engaged we want to apply for the Partner Visa as we're not sure when we want to get married - does anyone know if you can get married on the Partner Visa once in Aus? Also if the Visa is approved (I've heard roughly 6 months from application) how long do you get before you have to enter Australia? And do they tell you the date you have to enter or do you get certain dates to enter by? Also I want to hand in our application in person in London and if possible pay using our Australian debit card - has anyone had any experience doing this or advice? Any comments would be great, thanks!

moneypenny20

You apply for a Spouse Visa regardless of your relationship - defacto, engaged, married, whatever. You can marry one a Spouse Visa, with no problem. Once married though, let DIAC know.

You generally have a year to validate the visa - ie 12 months from the date of the Meds or the PCC whichever was earliest. You can either move in that 12 months or just travel over, your partner get their passport stamped and then go back to the UK to finalise stuff there. Once validated you have up to five years to move permanently. Those dates are given to you in both your partner's grant letter and on the Visa stamp.

You have to pay in pounds. You can use your Australian bank account but you would have to get a bank draft in pounds.

The London Office can only accept the following payment methods (neither Amex or cheque are acceptable):

• Maestro, Mastercard, Solo or Visa cards.
• Bank Drafts in pounds sterling and made payable to the 'Australian High Commission'. Clients whose bank is outside of the UK must ensure they request a bank draft that can be ‘cleared’ in the UK and paid into a UK bank account. London cannot accept bank drafts in EUROs, Australian Dollars or any currency Taken from the AHC London site.

Good luck. Don't forget to read the Spouse Visa thread. It's long but it's full of brilliant info and advice. Good luck.

GoldCoastMag

If you document your relationship and that you have been living together over a year you normally qualify for a temporary visa 309, but if you have evidence for 3 years or more you may be approved for a permanent visa (100) immediately.

The application is the same one, and the case officer CO is the one who decides what visa to approve.

The forms to fill in are a bit daunting, and seem never ending, one for you as sponsor and then one for dh as the applicant, and then collecting evidence to add to prove yourself. We found getting the letters from friends took the longest, so they probably are the ones Id start with, then the police checks for any country your dh has lived in more than a year. A copy of the long form birth certificate and copies of passports and official documents need notarizing too..

hope it helps, good luck

kateomaco

Thank you both for your info/advise!
Yes we are finding getting the stat dec's etc the longest, we've got some from relatives/friends in Australia and we were planning on getting some friends and relatives in UK to do them but I have read on here and on the Form 888 they can't fill out the same stat dec rather write a statement however the form says it should still be certified..does that mean they have to have copies of birth cert/passport like the Australians certified also?!

I'm relieved to hear you can get married on the partner visa as depending on when/if the visa is approved depends when we will get to Aus and start planning/saving for it. So once approved you have a choice of when to move over within a certain time period? I've read on here someone's visa was approved last week and they have to activate it by 4th April next year?!

Is it advisable for my partner to get a medical and police check before we hand the application in? I've read on the immi website that you do these after you've applied?

Thanks again!

hull2perth

I lodged a partner visa March 12 2011 and got it granted 17th August 2011 so took 5 months 1 week. and we have until April 2012 to enter

Bermudashorts

Do you have clear official proof of having lived at the same address? If so this is good evidence and you won't need to go overboard on declarations from friends and families.

The validation date for the visa will be based upon the date of medicals / PCC. So if he did them now, lodges the visa and it takes say 5 months to process, then he would only have another 7 months to make the trp to Australia to validate. If the vsa application took say 8 months then we would only have four months to validate etc. So he can do them, but needs to be aware that it will reduce the amount of time you have to get to Australia to validate.

kateomaco

Thanks both for making it clear on the time scale. Yes we have got bills in both names and joint bank accounts in UK & Australia as well as a letter from the real estate agents we rented from in Australia last year. So the medical & police check can be done after we lodge the application? Will the case officer advise when they need to be done?

Does anyone know if the statements from our friends/family in UK need to be certified with a copy of their passport/birth cert or is the statement sufficient?
Also is it advisable to put photos in the application? I've read someone put in about 14 photos in theirs!

Bermudashorts

I'd really look to firm up that address stuff, joint bank accounts are good but don't mean you lived together, joint bills are better. If you can get over three year's worth of evidence of defacto then he would get PR straight away which is much better for him.

Lots of people include photos but they are weak as evidence, chuck a couple in if you want but you have to ask what is it really proving. Address, address, address ... that is what it is all about.

Pollyana

You only need a copy of the ID to go with the statements if the person making the statement holds Aus PR or citizenship, otherwise its not necessary

PMV

Photos are submitted for Prospective Marriage Visas to help prove that the applicant/sponsor have met as they are often not living together or in the same country.

But for your visa application, you will be proving that you have lived together for 12 months rather than just having met at some point.

moneypenny20

If people don't have a great deal of 'legal' proof, they submit copies of photos showing (and proving) a relationship going back x years.

OP, Obviously they don't want to see albums of pics, just pick a few and scan 4 to a page.

Mazza12

Hi

We didn't have many bills in joint names but we had plenty of correspondence addressed to us individually at the same address over 3.5 years which we included in our application.

We also included photos (4 to a page as Moneypenny suggested and annotated with date and event/whereabouts) to back up significant events in the timeline of our relationship going back 6 years.

Our statements from UK family and friends were just signed by them with contact details printed below the signature. Only the Form 888s from Aussies were certified.

Good Luck with your application

kateomaco

Thanks for everyone's responses, much appreciated!

In regards to the address issue our bank statements are addressed to both of us at the one address since beginning of last year. We have lots of cards etc from friends and family which are made out to both of us, but this is hard to show as evidence as usually the envelope had just one of our names on the front. We were members of sports & social clubs in Australia which had our names/address etc. Also our payslips have the same address I guess we could put a couple of those in?
We also have plane tickets from a holiday in 09 and our trip to Australia as well as within Australia - so I'm hoping these will help?! We have got photos from almost the day we met so we should be fine with putting a couple of those in.

Does anyone have any info relating to the Police check & Medical i.e. when you are supposed to do them before you apply or after you apply - will the CO tell you when to do them?

Is it worth handing the application in in person?

moneypenny20

Anything that shows you lived in the same place or went to the same places is good. Flight tickets also excellent evidence.

As for the PCC and Meds. Don't do them until asked. You used to be advised to frontload, ie send the meds and PCC off with the application but that was in the days of a visa grant rarely taking more than a month. Now they are taking around 5-6 months and your validation period could end up being only a few months, not long enough to finalise your lives in the UK, or fit in a validation visit if you can't get time off work etc.

kateomaco

Thanks MP that's the answer I was looking for!!! I hope now I have most things clear just need to get it all filled out properly with all the bits & pieces!