Skilled - Independent (subclass 189) visa granted

[JEMS]

Hi

I did not want to participate in any forums until we got our visas. I always had this silent but nagging voice in my head that said, "What if you don't get the visas? You'd feel like an idiot then".

My husband started a conversation about moving to Australia one night in October 2014, completely out of the blue. Things in South Africa...we have two children and we see no future for them here. None. He is in IT and found his profession listed under the Oz Skilled Independent 189 Visa list and we decided, Why not? What do we have to lose (except the R100k odd it would cost us, lol).

Anyway, we decided to use an Immigration service and officially started the process on the 7^th of November 2014. We applied for all our Unabridged Birth Certificates on the 14th of Nov 2014. The kids and I got ours pretty fast, within a couple of weeks, however my husband was not as lucky, and it took him nearly 5 months and daily harassment of the HA department to get it.

He received a positive skills assessment on the 22^nd of January 2015.

He wrote his IELTS on the 10^th of January 2015. Got a Band Score of 8. I wrote mine on the 28^th of February 2015, got a Band Score of 8.5.

Lodged our Expression of Interest on the 2^nd or 3^rd of Feb 2015. We missed the cut-off for the first round of invites, but received our invitation during the second round on the 27^th of February 2015.

Official Visa application date was the 10^th of March 2015.

We applied for our PCC sometime in April 2015 (I will lie now if I give an exact date, but it was in early April, just before Easter). We received our certificates within 3 weeks after submission, by the around the 20/21^st of April, however, my certificate did not list my maiden name and had to be redone. Took an extra 4 working days.

We booked our medicals for the 21^st of April and final documentation was submitted on Friday the 24^th of April 2015.

We received documentation that our Oz case officer was assigned on the 1^st of May 2015.

And received a lovely email on the 8^th of May 2015 to advise that our Visas were GRANTED J

Best and most terrifying feeling in the world.

So now, after a few weeks of letting this all set in a bit, it is crunch time. My husband will be heading over in August to start looking for work and getting us settled in, and the kids and I will then hopefully follow in December or January 2016. School only lets out on the 9th of December, so I am stuck here until then.

So all in all, it took us 6 months and 1 day from starting the process, to getting the visas. If we did not drag our feet with regards to the PCC and Medicals, it might even have happened two months earlier.

Anyway, as we go further along with this process, I will most probably start participating a bit more. I have a 9 year old and a 10 month old and our priority is getting them settled in as painlessly as possible

[Mara]

Welcome to the forum

Sounds like you had a fairly smooth road till now!

Good luck with the rest of your journey... hope that it goes well for hubby when he arrives and that he lands that elusive job quickly!

[Cole]

Wow Jems it's great to hear your path was relatively pain-free. Your timeline is very similar to ours, although we're still waiting for a visa. Good luck to your husband for the job-hunt, we wish him well and hope that you and your family have a wonderful experience!