Fisher1

Hi. I have no experience of moving my kid at that age, but just wanted to say that I moved schools as a fourteen year old many years ago and was really worried about making friends. The second day I was there I met someone who has been a close friend now for nearly sixty years, and was incredibly happy in my new location, which I still call home. It isn’t a good age to be moving but it isn’t the end of the world either. As a retired teacher who worked in an international school with lots of comings and goings, I would echo the comments of others on this page - try for year nine if you can. Good luck with it all, it’s a nerve wracking time.

Not much help, but I can tell you that when we sold a rental property in the UK five years ago, as very new arrivals here, we didn’t have to pay Capital gains on the UK property (which we had never lived in) because contracts were exchanged after we left the country. We did have to pay C.G. here jn Australia but I can’t remember what percentage it was.

Hi. Don’t know if this is any help but we were on the 103 list for two years from 2013 and when we switched to the 143 in 2015 they counted the two years we had already been waiting. We were lucky, the wait was aproximately two years for a 143 back then so we got our visa almost immediately after we swapped. I have a friend who didn’t want to wait the four or five years (six even?) that the 143 now takes, so she came over on a visitors visa and applied for an onshore aged parents visa from here. She risks being deported if she (eventually) fails her medical, but feels the risk is worth being able to be here with her family and be part of her grandchildren’s lives.

I agree! When we were waiting we were in a different position as we knew it would be about two years (this was in 2014). We had the additional complication that even when we got our visa we might have to wait another year or more because we couldn’t leave my very elderly mum - who didn’t have long to live. So we decided to try and forget about the visa (difficult when our new born grandson in Sydney was growing bigger every day). We concentrated on spending time with old friends, particularly those who didn’t live close by. We made budget trips to our favourite places in Europe. We also formulated a ‘Plan B’ - to be activated if we failed our medicals. We made plan B so attractive that by the time we got our visas in 2016 we were almost disappointed not to be going to live near friends in Spain! In short, we got on with our lives. We had a long holiday in Oz in 2016 when our visas were issued, and visited several places outside Sydney so that we knew exactly where we wanted to live - that was a massive help later. I joined the FB community page for our future home to get the feel of the place, and trawled Realestate.com to get an idea of property prices. My mum died early in 2017 and we arrived here in August that year. Our grand daughter was born the week we arrived. The wait is a pain, but it passed - and it was a great opportunity to plan.

haha I used to do that - I used to write each spend in the back of my cheque book as though I'd written a cheque, and work out the running total at the end of the day.

Exactly. I was saying airmiles but I'd be equally happy to have points - just a bonus on the shopping I'd be doing anyway. I'm not that desperate, I was just gobsmacked at the idea that I could be refused a credit card before they even got round to asking details of my income! I was also annoyed because Mr Zoom also made it clear that he found it amusing that I was applying for a credit card and my husband would be the second card holder.

I was thinking more about being able to upgrade to a different class using airmiles.

I’m going to give it a go.

Yes, I can see that would be difficult, but the bank's issue with me was that the income did not arise in Australia.

My original comment wasn't about having a low income - it was about being refused a credit card because the income arose outside Australia. It means that if you move to live in Australia, you are forever banned from having a credit card, no matter what your credit score or how long you have lived here?

It's ridiculous! If they are so concerned about their miserable few thousand dollars, they could surely ask for surety - like cash to be kept on deposit for the first year or something? I really wanted those air miles

I hadn't considered that possibility - it's not very comfortable to think about people being in that situation but yes, in extremis I can see that a credit card could be a life saver.

It can encourage overspending. However, having previously had a credit card for thirty one years without once failing to pay the entire balance at the end of the month, we're quietly confident that we could cope. Thanks for the concern though - some people do get into a right mess.

Can hugely recommend Alan Collet - he saved us a small fortune in tax when we moved here five years ago.

Yes. We were once refused a 20% mortgage on a flat in the UK by the UK bank to which my salary had been paid for seventeen years by the same employer, no overdrafts, no loans, one credit card. The reason? Although I was employed by the dept of Education in the UK, I was on a seconded post and living outside the UK! We closed our account and borrowed elsewhere. Infuriating though. My husband was laughing about our current situation afterwards - he pointed out that we could win squillions of pounds on the lottery and - theoretically - they wouldn’t give us a credit card. Daft.

Considering the account has been open for more than ten years and there’s always been a credit balance, we own our own home in Australia outright and have assets elsewhere in Australia, I thought it was a bit outlandish to refuse without even checking our income. Luckily we didn’t actually need a card, we just wanted the air miles.

Hi Ramot, yes all well with us, thankfully weren’t impacted by floods, just the endless rain. Your reply is interesting because it shows that a credit card is possible! I was very annoyed with Westpac because we have had our account open for ten years -since long before we left the UK, and there’s been quite a lot of money through it. For a credit limit of $6000 dollars! The guy we spoke to thought it was ‘interesting’ that I would be the main account holder, and found it hard to believe that we had no other credit cards. So we’re thinking of moving the account anyway. I think I’ll look into the Qantas card, thanks for the info. Hope all’s well with you.

Hi all, I recently decided to apply for a credit card because I wanted to get airmiles rewards on my spending - it seemed like a good idea at the time. I am now an Australian citizen, have had my account with the bank in question for ten years, loads of money through it and never overdrawn. I’ve been living at the same address in Australia for just over four years. I have a retirement income well in excess of the minimum outlined by the bank, and have most of it transferred here from the UK. So I was gobsmacked to be told by a not-very-nice man on zoom (in the manager’s office, in place of the manager!) that I was not eligible for a credit card. I notice they have recently changed their web page eligibility criteria to include the need for a verifiable Australian income. I’ve decided the airmiles aren’t worth it, but this seems crazy to me. Is this typical, or are all Australian banks weird about foreign income?

My niece lives in London and my sister lives in Stafford. But my sister is in a bubble with her son who lives in Sheffield, and it’s my understanding that people over the age of sixty cannot be in a bubble with two different families? I used my sister as an example of the fact that everything is far from easy in the UK. People are being limited in their movement in all sorts of ways, for instance I have many friends in my home town who are only allowed out to excercise, and no driving allowed. My point was that until we get this virus under control everyone will suffer limitations to some extent.

Regarding your sister in law - things are pretty much the same in the uk for women in the sixty plus age group, who now have to wait until they are sixty six to access their contributory state pension. This means that many women in the Uk (categorized as elderly and vulnerable) have been forced by financial necessity to continue working on the front line in schools and hospitals. So things aren’t that rosy in the UK either. I’ve only been in Australia for three years, and I had planned a trip back this year, which obviously isn’t happening. I am quite homesick at the moment, but do you know what? I thank my lucky stars every day that I’m here in a place with such low infection rates that I can live an almost normal life - especially when I speak to my sister who lives alone and hasn’t seen her daughter for over a year. Fundamental right to a family life? I think we all need to accept things the way they are and get on with our lives as best we can.

Pity they didn’t do that in the first place.

Generalisation is seldom wise. I’m a ‘left leaning’ person and I don’t have a particular gripe about anything.

Hi Noshee. I got my permanent residence in 2016 then returned to the UK for sixteen months. Haven’t left since. I am currently applying for citizenship - as someone said, they allow you twelve months away in four years. The calculator is good, but I also discovered that if you begin filling in a citizenship application online and you are too early the programme tells you so, tells you when you will be elligibke and shuts you down - so if the programme allows you to apply, you know you’re okay

Dusty plains said he was happy with the current arrangements for leaving Australia. Many people in Australia must feel grateful for the draconian rules that have kept them safe - I know I do - but I’m sure most people would also feel the utmost sympathy for people like you, who are suffering because of those same rules. Thirteen years ago I watched my father die of cancer during a weeks ‘holiday’ from my job outside the UK, knowing that if his death took longer than a week I would have to leave ... so I have some small notion of the grief you must be enduring, particularly with your husband’s ill health to contend with. I hope you can get through this harrowing time and back to Australia with the minimum of further anguish. People do care.

Yes I’m going to go to M&S online - need my Marks’ knickers! I stocked up when I was in the UK in 2019 but of course our proposed bi- annual visiting plan has hit a bit of a glitch ... people dont seem to do the white trouser thing round here, but I know what you mean!