Hi Karen
It is super to hear from you again.
In addition to the Post Office, St John Ambulance also do stand-alone policies for ambulance cover only and it really is essential to get this insurance without delay because the bill for a one-way ride to hospital in an emergency ambulance can be anywhere from $500 to $800 depending on how acute the illness/injury is.
With regard to GP services for Dad, a lot of GPs bulk bill for children and those of 65 or over. It shouldn't be impossible to find a bulk-billing GP for Dad reasonably locally to you, which would save him money and also save him the hassle of having to get involved with Medicare claims or reclaims.
To track down the resources for Dad, there may be stuff on
www.seniors.gov.au (I don't know - I've never studied it closely.)
If you contact Seniors Card (which has has nothing to do with the main Seniors website, you may be able to wheedle a Seniors Card for Dad considering that he has now moved to Oz permanently to all intents & purposes.
Welcome to Seniors Card
Seniors Card- Department of Planning and Community Development
I've been told about a British couple in Adelaide who have applied for non-contributory Aged Parent visas (friends of friends.) They are living in Adelaide on Bridging Visas whilst they wait for their APV application to crawl to the top of the Queue. Apparently they both have Seniors Cards, so the people in Vic can ring their oppos in Adelaide if they need encouragement about this!
Worth a go because the card does offer some good discounts and the latest news from the POPC suggests that Dad's CPV application is likely to take two years to process unless the quota of CPVs is increased again in July 2009.
The POPC are saying that by the end of October if not before they will have allocated (not necessarily granted, but allocated ) all 6,500 CPVs available in the 2008/9 Program Year; that is able to be granted before 30th June 2009. They say they are already holding enough applications to fill the quota of 6,500 visas for 2009/10 as well, ergo they are predicting that people who have applied in the last 6 months or so may well not be able to get their CPVs granted until after 1st July 2010. Seniors Card should be sympathetic is you show them this article by Alan Collett of Go Matilda:
Go Matilda - Your Gateway to Australia - News
Alan is in Melbourne, so they can ring him up as well if they don't believe thee & me:
Go Matilda - Your Gateway to Australia - Contact and Feedback
Go Matilda - Your Gateway to Australia - Contact and Feedback
When are your two children in the UK planning to validate their
PR visas? Remember that it is essential for them to do so prior to the Initial Entry Date given in the Grant letter and repeated on the visa labels.
Best wishes
Gill
xx
