Meet and Greet in Adelaide

[shorty]

Can anyone who has made use of the "meet and greet" service in Adelaide give me more info on what is provided and what the service is like. I have heard that some of the accommodation provided is not in very good areas and one needs to be careful - is this true? Is it a good idea to make use of this or rather to make own plans i.e. stay in a hotel?

[Annette]

Hi Shorty,

We made use of this service. We had a volunteer pick us up at the airport. He then arranged for a taxi to take us to our accommodation. One taxi is paid for by the government, we had to pay for a second one because we had so much luggage. Some people strike it lucky and get a meet and greet volunteer with a big car, so they don't need any extra taxis. We got an information pack welcoming us to the State, which included lots of useful information and telephone numbers for all the services we needed. We also got a UBD street atlas for Adelaide and surrounding areas. The chap then took us shopping, showing us where the nearest shops, banks and public transport were. We did some grocery shopping and he also helped us to get a phone simcard for our cellphones.

It was a weekend, so on the Monday he came again and then took us to the city to activate our bank account (which we had opened before we arrived) and he was going to take us to the tax office to get our tax file numbers, but we were tired, so he told us how to do it online. He also told us how Medicare worked and offered to take us to the office to register after 10 days, but we were happy to do it ourselves. He gave us his number and email address so we could contact him about anything we wanted to know and also explained to us about the On Arrival accommodation service and what the rules and regulations were.

When you fill in the forms for the on arrival accommodation, you can put down that you want public or private accommodation. Private is of course much more expensive. We went for public accommodation. You can put a preference of area down and they do their best to find you something near where you want to be. Look, the public accommodation is not going to be luxurious. I don't know about the areas, I have had a lot of contact with people who have used this service and the areas don't seem to be a problem, more the fact that some of the places aren't quite as clean as others - this is probably because they rely on the previous occupant to leave it the way they found it. We had a newly redecorated duplex in a quiet cul de sac. It was basic, but very clean and totally adequate for our needs. I would say that if you are a fussy person who is used to the best, lived in a comfortable, luxurious suburb (and I suppose many South Africans do fall into this category) and have the money to spend on hotel accommodation, don't even consider it.

We were only too thankful to have somewhere to stay immediately, which was all sorted for us, at quite frankly a ridiculously low rent and which we could vacate at short notice when we found our own place. We paid $188 per week for a 3 bedroom fully furnished place, including all utilities. I can tell you that for equivalant accomodation privately we would have paid at least $300 per week and probably much, much more. We simply didn't have the funds for that. You can stay for 12 weeks maximum and have to give 2 weeks notice to vacate (we were told 7 days is also acceptable, as the service is so overbooked).

I think for the convenience of not having the hassle of sorting something out and having the chance to stay in accommodation which is so ridiculously cheap and conveniently located, people should just be thankful for what they get. Beggars can't be choosers, don't look a gift horse in the mouth etc. etc.... This is a service meant to help people and is probably not meant for people who don't really need the help and are going to be snobs about where they end up. (Not saying that's you, of course, Shorty! )

[shorty]

Thanks for your wise assistance Annette - it is always most helpful to hear it from the horses mouth! I think we will most probably go the meet and greet route as it seems the most practical and resourceful (especially when you are short of the bucks...)