Getting the Visa

I occurred to me while chatting to someone about my forthcoming move that I'd rather glossed over the visa process in my first blog entry. So I though I'd do a quick entry on what I had to do and the rough costs and timescales involved.

Initially we were going to do everything ourselves. However, after my wife had a conversation with someone who said that it had taken her over three years to get a spouse visa, we decided to find an agency to help us.

We visited the Toast Australia festival and met Dianne Perry of Advantage Migration. She gave us some useful information and when the time came to start the visa process we contacted her. 

She made sure that we had the latest forms to fill in and was there for us to answer questions when we weren't sure what to write. She also made sure that we supplied the correct documentation and checked everything that we sent before she sent them onto the Australian Immigration department.

Of course, this all costs money. Advantage Migration charge A$3000 for their services and the visa was about A$1500. On top of this was £10 for a police certificate that shows your criminal record (or lack of) and £250 for a medical.

We also had to get character references - preferably from Australians - saying what a fine fellow I was and show evidence that my wife and I had been together for a good while (bank statements, mortgage statements, insurances etc). 

One of the most surprising questions was that I had to supply a list of every time I had left the country in the last ten years. As I travel quite a bit with my job, that wasn't an easy task. However, with passport stamps, work invoices and, believe it or not, digital photo timestamps I managed to work out pretty much all of my trips - there were over fifty of them!

I applied for the visa around February/March time and I went for my medical in May. I finally heard in July that my visa had been granted and I have until May 2009 to validate it. 

Selling, Shipping and Scams

We've decided not to take too much with us as my wife still has a fair amount of stuff in storage in Australia. What we have decided to take is a few pieces of furniture, my guitars and amplifier, some books (mostly my cookery books) and personal effects.

The rest of our stuff, my CD's, LP's and various collections for example, will be looked after by my parents until we decide that we want to ship them over (the items, not my parents...) So I've arranged for a couple of companies, Robinsons International Removals and Excess Baggage to give us a quote.

Once of the things we're concerned about is shipping wooden items as we've heard that it can cost quite a lot to get them treated, so that is something that we will want to ask each of them, so at least we'll have an idea on costs.

Finally, my wife has been trying to sell her car on Autotrader. Within a day of the advert going online she had an email enquiry from someone allegedly in Spain who made a very good offer and said they would be sending a Certified Bank Draft for somewhat more than the offer and asking that we send the difference to the shipping company. Alarm bells started ringing and I began Googling to see what I could find out. From the number of people that had received almost identical emails, this appears to be a scam, possibly using stolen Bank Drafts that are cancelled after you have forwarded the money to the "shipping company" leaving you several thousand pounds out of pocket. So, be warned and if you are contacted this way, make sure you check it out thoroughly!

Jobs, Wills and Parties.

It took a little while, I guess the big corporate wheels turn quite slowly, but I have now had my job transfer to Sydney confirmed. The package isn't bad, although I lose some of my yearly holiday allowance which is a bit annoying. I sort of understand their reasoning as it would be a little unfair if I had more holiday than everyone else in the office, however I was led to believe initially that I would keep my current allowance. I can live with it though. However, I get some of it back due to the fact that Australia has more public holidays than the UK. It's not quite the same, but better than nothing.

I've sent my contract off to the people dealing with our finances to see if I qualify for any of the Living Away from Home benefits that Australia offer.

One of the things we've been meaning to do for a long time is to make a will. We did do one a year or so back with someone who was advertising in our local shopping mall. However, they made a real hash of it, getting names wrong etc so we demanded our money back. To avoid nasty things such as inheritance tax, we have to have a will made before leaving the UK. So, we thought we'd take advantage of Will Aid. This is a great idea where we can get a will made through a local participating solicitor and the money that we pay will go to charity. So, I booked up this morning for both of us to visit Thomson Snell & Passmore next week.

Finally, we decided that we'd have to have a party before we went, so that we could say goodbye to all our friends and family and this morning we booked a date at a pub/restaurant in Essex. It looks like a great place, and the person I spoke to on the phone was very friendly and helpful. We're going to pop up there sometime soon for lunch and to have a look around.