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Giz

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Hi all (in my best Freestate English!)

Ek (+vrou + dogtertjie) oorweeg sterk om oor te kom en is besig om werk te soek en dalk selfs te kry :ilikeit:

Ons verwag binnekort ons tweede, wat die spanner so bietjie in die wiele gooi, sal maar sien hoe dit uitdraai, met die mediese kostes en so.

Dit lyk of ek in QLD sal eindig, waarskeinlik in een van die kleiner dorpe (stede?) soos Miles, Chinchilla, kannie die ander onthou nie... :ilikeit:

As iemand dalk weet hoe dit daar lyk of self daar rond bly sal ek graag wil gesels.

Ek begin nou eers met die effort en is sover baie trots op die un-abridged sertifikate wat ek in die hande kon kry, wag nou al vir my police clearance en my huis is in die mark :( nou nog net die res :ilikeit: ....

Dankie vir een uitstekende site en ongelooflike vriendelike/hulpvaardige mense: hoop om dalk eendag van julle te ontmoet :ilikeit:

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Guest Sunshine Sister

Hey there Giz and family,

Welcome to our forum ! We have loads of fabulous ppl in QLD and I am sure they will all jump in and answer everything/anything you could possibly want to know. Good luck with what sounds like the last stretch of your process.

Regards from Sydney

Sunshine Sister

:ilikeit:

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Hi Giz and the Gang,

I've been away from the the forum for a while, so welcome from me first of all. As SS says, we've got plenty of members living in QL :ilikeit: D, so I'm sure you'll get assistance on state specific questions from those guys.

Good luck with everything!

Cheers

Ajay

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hi giz

welkom!

toemaar, jou vrystaat engels sal gou-gou opgeposlish word! as mens heeldag engels praat raak dit darem makliker maar dis steeds heerlik om afrikaanse vriende te he waar die woorde en emosies net makliker verduidelik en vloei!! ek bly nie in QLD nie en was nog nie daar nie so ek kan ongelukkig nie veel raad daar gee nie.

sterkte met die baba en byt vas met al die papierwerk en dinge. dis oor en oor die moeite werd om deur te druk en te kom!

corne'

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Hi Giz and family :)

Welcome to the forum and good luck with the rest of your plans. To be honest I had never heard of either Miles or Chinchilla :blush: but after a quick google I see they are about 300kms west of Brisbane. I found a site where you can get a bit of an idea how they look at least, if you haven't already.

http://www.australianexplorer.com/photogra...cture_miles.htm

http://www.australianexplorer.com/photogra..._chinchilla.htm

L'mari from the forum lives in Milmerran which is not too far from those towns so I am sure that she will be able to give you a bit of info on them.

Good luck finding a job - what employment line are you in?

If you need any info on QLD in general I'll be happy to help. We have just moved to Beaudesert, which is a small town about 65kms south of Brisbane. We stayed in Namaqualand/Weskus in SA so we wanted to move to a smaller town but not quite as far away from the city as we were there (255kms) so for us Beaudesert is the best of both worlds. :blush-anim-cl:

Julie :)

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Thanx all for the hearty welcome, it definately helps ease the pressure to know other people have done this and survived :blush: .

I have just received an offer for employment and our combined hearts are racing: absolute shock/fright :blush-anim-cl: now to take the dip or not, that is the question? :)

At least this gives me a bit of a kick start with the questions:

I'm offered 40 hrs per week, in brackets the employer quotes: extra work time may be required....

Is this a catch and would this imply overtime?

Also: 20 days vacation + 10 days sick (after a qualifying period???) is this typical?

They want me to start 16 October 2006, wow, that's like in 3 weeks time; how do they manage to do this..visas, etc?

My wife is pregnant :) with a due date early Jan 2007, so I guess it will happen in Oz? The company do however offer medical, but is it likely that the medical will cover the expense so early on in employment?

If anybody can give me an idea of how much medical costs for a family of 3 (+1) I would be ever in your dept.

Well then there is the money and they offer "structuring". This includes LAFHA, which I am told dissapeears as soon as one becomes a PR (my intent). Is this a catch and what questions should I be asking? :blush:

The nett offer is for +/- $60 000, is this liveable and reasonable (I'm an engineer :whome: )

I guess this only the start of oblivion for me but what the hell, I think we'll give it a go ... maybe..... :blush:

Edited by Giz
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Guest Sunshine Sister
My wife is pregnant :blush-anim-cl: with a due date early Jan 2007, so I guess it will happen in Oz? The company do however offer medical, but is it likely that the medical will cover the expense so early on in employment?

If anybody can give me an idea of how much medical costs for a family of 3 (+1) I would be ever in your dept.

Well then there is the money and they offer "structuring". This includes LAFHA, which I am told disappears as soon as one becomes a PR (my intent). Is this a catch and what questions should I be asking? :blush:

Hey there,

Ok, firstly take a deep breath, as things can seem VERY overwhelming. Many of us have been through this and are better, healthier, happier and smarter for it !! :)

We are here on a temporary visa, which means we need to take out private medical, our medical insurance is with mbf (click here for their website). We have been happy with their service - we are a family of 4, two adults, two young kids. Depending on the kind of coverage you choose your monthly payment can be anything from $ 350 to $ 550. We have opted for good coverage as with kids you just never know what happens next, and we pay around $ 450 per month. When you are new on our medical aid you have all kinds of periods you need to wait before they start covering you for pre-existing conditions (as they call it). For pregnancy you have to wait 12 months on our medical aid before they will cover your costs, 6 months for eyes/glasses/lenses, 3 months for certain teeth defects etc. So in our case our medical aid wouldn't cover your wife's condition. It might be useful to find out which medical aid your company will be signing you up with, as we can then check their conditions for you, to see whether you will be covered.

As far as LAFHA goes, you are right as soon as you have PR you lose your LAFHA advantage, which is something to consider. If you are coming to NSW on a temporary visa please note that you will need to pay $ 4500 per year per child for schooling whereas most other States (think QLD is one of these states but not sure) won't charge you anything. Best thing to do is to ask the company if they could please show you how they structure their LAFHA packages to give you an idea of how much you would benefit from it. You will get some advantage on the amount you will be able to pay for rent as well as a food allowance which you will be able to deduct from tax, some allow for flights back home, no medicare payments and all kinds of other weird and wonderful deductions. It can make quite a big difference to your budget, depending on how they structure it for you.

Hope this has helped a little.

Stuur groete vir die Vrystaat.

Liefde uit Sydney

Sunshine Sister

:)

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Hi Giz

Seems like we have each taken a section of your questions and assisted with that part, so here is my reply to

I'm offered 40 hrs per week, in brackets the employer quotes: extra work time may be required....

Is this a catch and would this imply overtime?

Also: 20 days vacation + 10 days sick (after a qualifying period???) is this typical?

Yes, the employer is indicating that overtime may be required, what you have to check is the following:

1. would it be paid overtime

2. would it be time off in lieu of overtime

3. would it be overtime without any compensation

20 days vacation - that is the norm in Australia

10 days sick leave - that is the norm in Australia, as well

I don't know what they mean by a qualifying period? However, you usually get both from the day you start, but on a pro-rata basis for the first year. Some companies insist that you cannot take annual leave until you have been there a year, but this is rare. You may also want to check how cumulative the annual leave and sick leave is. Some companies have rules about this.

Then a question you have not asked, but which will come up is superannuation.

Usually super is an extra 9% over and above your salary that the employer pays into your super fund (pension)

On rare occasions though, when they quote you a salary, they include the super, so you must check with them whether the $60,000 includes or excludes your super.

In Australia it is not compulsory for you to contribute towards your super, but you are allowed to do so, if you wish. The choice is yours as to what super you belong to, I like the industry super funds, they seem to give more return on their investments. A good one is Australian Super, just a suggestion if you wish to do further research.

Hope this has helped.

Mara

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Welcome GIZ from the beautiful Queensland.

I have been through Miles and Chinchilla on the Warrego Highway.Both are East of the Great Dividing Range so still lots of trees. Closest city is Toowoomba. Listen- maybe not quite Reddersburg or Dewetsdorp, but these are small towns. Are you living in a small town now?

I do believe this as good a place as any to begin. It will just be a huge adjustment if you come from a city.

To Jules- was at the Kooralbyn Resort last weekend and passed through the pretty town of Beaudesert.Obviously rain has fallen as everything seemed quite green.

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Hey Qld Girl :huh:

Still haven't been to Kooralbyn, even though it's just around the corner now. :whome: We must make a plan to go . If you came in from the Canungra side then you would have passed some roadworks just before you come into Beaudesert. We are on the left hand side going up the hill, on a new estate. B)

Sorry for going :whome: there Giz :angry:

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Hi GiZ,

Congratulations on your offer, first of all :whome: Here are some answers that I hope will help you:

I'm offered 40 hrs per week, in brackets the employer quotes: extra work time may be required....

Is this a catch and would this imply overtime?

40 hours per week is typical, and most employment contracts state this (ie, there may be occassions where you are required to work outside of these hours etc etc). One would normally expect either overtime, or else time off in lieu, but I would check more explicitly with your employer.

Also: 20 days vacation + 10 days sick (after a qualifying period???) is this typical?

This is the standard leave offering - typically you aren't able to take paid annual or sick leave during your probation, but the company must still accrue it.

They want me to start 16 October 2006, wow, that's like in 3 weeks time; how do they manage to do this..visas, etc?

They are being ambitious, but it can be done, if they are a pre-approved business sponsor. Ive just done a visa for a guy, also with a pregnant wife, and got it approved within 5 days. However, this isn't normally the case - they gave me special priority because the pregnancy was far advanced and she would have been unable to fly if the process had taken the normal 4-8 weeks .

My wife is pregnant with a due date early Jan 2007, so I guess it will happen in Oz? The company do however offer medical, but is it likely that the medical will cover the expense so early on in employment?

If anybody can give me an idea of how much medical costs for a family of 3 (+1) I would be ever in your dept.

First of all, be aware that your wife will need to go for X-Rays as part of her visa application - she seems advanced enough in her pregnancy for the risk to be low, but it is something that you may want to research further. As SS said, most medical funds will not cover any existing condition (including pregnancy), so you will more than likely have to foot this expense yourself. I don't know what this wuld be, but will ask the employee mentioned earlier - he has the same situation. I'll let you know what he says when I see him on Tuesday. Find out what medical fund the company is putting you on and then check out their website,

Well then there is the money and they offer "structuring". This includes LAFHA, which I am told dissapeears as soon as one becomes a PR (my intent). Is this a catch and what questions should I be asking?

LAFHA is a great tax benefit, in that it allows your employer to pay you a certain amount of your income tax free (similar to a car allowance in SA, where only a portion was taxable). It depends on the size of your family etc, but can result in a substantial saving. It does disappear once you become a permanent resident though (after all, you can no longer claim that you are living away from home when you are a PR). Bear in mind that they cannot drop your taxable income below $41850 (which is the prescibed minimum for sponsored workers non IT), but that still means that you could end up with as much as around $18K per annum tax free. Go to www.ato.gov.au for the tax rates, or if you want, PM me and I will go through your contract with you and try do a rough calc for you on what you should expect as a nett salary)

The nett offer is for +/- $60 000, is this liveable and reasonable (I'm an engineer )

This is always the hardest question, because living standards are very subjective, and it also depends on where you are going (whichs state), as this differs from city to city as well. I know people that are earning a similar wage and seem to be OK, but I know that my family probably couldn't live on that for too long. Then again, I have 2 cars, 2 kids (11 and 13), big house with pool etc. If we downgraded a bit, we could probably get by. But take lots of advice from lots of people - and then make your own decision. A pretty fair indicator is to do rand/A$ conversion, as I've found the cost of living to be similar. Slightly higher here in Sydney, especially on accomodation and entertainment, but generally similar. So, if you are managing to live on the equivalent in Rands currently, then chances are you will be OK here. My fellow forumites are free to disagree with me on this point :whome:

Just check whether or not the compulsory 9% Superannuation contribution is included in the $60K or if it is over and above, as this will have an impact on your nett result.

Best of luck - and take SS's wise advice - breathe!

Love

Ajay

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Hi Giz,

As everyone has already covered your questions, all I would like to say is welcome to the forum, and good luck with the big decision!

Greetings,

Dreamy

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