PatrickW

Hi Flex!

Great to see another South African apply! And congrats for getting your application in before the big change.

The link to the spreadsheet is on the first post of this thread, and also here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AqEBgay7xfFvdEpQS2NMbTItV1o5bTctcE4wa1pVWHc&hl=en_GB#gid=1

The spreadsheet hasn't been updated in about a month, though, which is pretty sad.

If there's anyone willing and able to update the spreadsheet, please try and get in touch with Florentinustay, who is supposed to be updating it - and you'll be given access to edit the spreadsheet.

Cheers

PatrickW

Congratulations, Craigdon, Heidim and ERIKinSA

Great to see the movement at DIAC. Got to clear the backlog before end of the month, and the start of the new system, I expect.

Celebrate! And good luck for your new lives down under!

PatrickW

Hi all

Who is supposed to be updating the spreadsheet? I've not seen any changes being made.

Has Flo moved on to other things?

PatrickW

Hey, no worries!

I saw it as a general query too - not specifically at either of us!

:cool:

Hah, fantastic news, Jit7!

Congratulations, and enjoy leaving behind the old stresses of waiting for the visa, and welcoming the new stresses of the move! Exciting times await us all!

PatrickW

Hi all

My medicals were all marked as 'met' and 'finalised' on Saturday this past weekend. After doing the 6-8 online checks a day, I decided to give DIAC a gentle prompting, so I phoned the contact centre from home this morning. Not too bad a wait - the phonecall was only 9 minutes in total: just politely asking if there were any outstanding requirements from my side, if I needed to send anything final, how long it might take to get the visa finalised etc.

I was told by the operator, after looking up my details, that all was showing as met on their side, and my case looked decision-ready; so he made a note on the file for my case officer that all was in order.

When I got in to work, I checked my status routinely (ho hum) expecting nothing major, only to see "APPLICANT APPROVED" for the three of us!

We are so thrilled here! I've not stopped grinning like a Cheshire cat since I saw the online status - and the email was just behind, with all of the official documentation. Go Team 4!

We're not going to do a LSD visit, we'll just do the move over to Perth in around September-ish this year - depending on the house and car sales.

I'd like to express my sincere appreciation to the people who have administered this thread; you've done a great job - and the spreadsheet has been an invaluable resource (on a related note, please turn me PURPLE, baby!), and also to the people who have contributed to the thread; the personal glitches and questions and problems and snags in your own visa applications that you have shared, have asked the questions I've had; and your kind, sensible and supportive answers have provided me with the answers to my own issues.

Thanks again to everyone - you're a great crowd of people!

Hope to see you down under!

Cheers,

PatrickW

P.S. Can anyone explain the meaning of the following from my 'entitlement details' page: Enter before date: 13/04/2013 (normal, no problem); Must not arrive after: 06/05/2012 - seems a touch impossible to me...

Hi Sujit.

I sent the supervisor login details to Flo, who is administering the thread at the moment - now that SHandGH are moving onward and southward.

I'll try and sort that out in the meantime, though - but Flo will (I assume) be continuing with the administration of the thread.

Cheers

PatrickW

One day into the waiting room and I think I have officially gone mad. I have been checking my status constantly. I checked at 11pm last night then 2am then 5 am and about 4 times since then. I bet the case officer has gone home already and making dinner on the bbq and yet i still keep checking!

 

:arghh: :mad:

I'm fully with you on this one Jit7.

I've now been in the waiting room for going on 3 weeks. Medicals were delivered to DIAC on Monday 14 May 2012; marked as received on Friday 18 May, but one set of medicals were referred.

Today I got the referred set of medicals marked as 'finalised' - so I've now gone from the general paranoid visa checking of 6-8 times a day to the more frenetic shoving-to-get-to-the-exit-door-of-the-waiting-room checking of every 10 minutes or so.

ARGH!

Hurry up already!

*ahem* I'm trying to stay cool here, but I'm struggling.

Patrick

P.S. My morning ritual is:

1. Get woken up by the alarm on my iPhone

2. Roll over and turn off the alarm

3. Press the 'email' button

4. Check for an email from DIAC

5. Sigh, swear, and re-set the alarm for 20 minutes' snooze time

6. Go back to sleep

We're a strange breed of person in the waiting room.

Hi, all

As you can now see, all incarnations of this thread have now been merged into a single thread.

The Admins have changed the ownership of the thread to the account name 'cat4july2011', and I've given the password to this account to Flo to carry on administering and updating this thread.

When Flo moves on with a visa, the username and password can be passed on to the next person taking over the updating of the thread.

Hope this helps. I know I'm finding it much easier to search just this one thread than 4, as previously.

Cheers

PatrickW

My understanding of the process is it is a year from the date which the Medicals were completed, or the police clearance was issued to you.

Here's a question for you to discuss and to think about. It says after your Visa is granted you have 1 year from the date of your PCC/Medical (whichever comes first) before to make your first entry to have your visa validated. So is the date of the PCC/Medical the date it was taken or the date it was uploaded?

Hi Guys, it's SHandGH here.I have set up a new user for this. Since youve already been in touch Patrick maybe you could ask the mod / admin to now merge the threads? I'll PM you with the login details.

Hi - Thanks for setting this up, Stephen.

I'll contact Admin and give them the go-ahead.

Watch this space!

Patrick

Hi all

 

With the impending move of Stephen to bigger and better things (who has done a brilliant job of continuing this thread), a thought occurs to me. I don't know if it's possible, or permissible on this forum, but having the same thread split into 3 parts (soon to be 4) makes searching historical things tricky.

 

What I propose is something like this:

 

Instead of having to create new threads every time one of the thread owners moves on, is it not possible to create a dummy account with a username like "Cat4Poster" or something, who can edit the first post in the thread, and the spreadsheet, and record PINKS and PURPLES etc.; but that person also has a separate personal account that they can use to post issues relating to their own CO and grant and doc requirements etc.?

 

That way, when the person behind these two usernames moves on to planning the Aus move, as we all hope to do soon, they can give the password to the "Cat4Poster" account to the person who wants to take over the thread, without 1) compromising the integrity of personal posts that may have been made (because the personal posts will have been made under the personal username) and 2) without having to create a new thread from scratch each time.

 

Is this possible? If so, why not try that, Florentinustay?

 

Just a thought.

 

Anyway, back to work, and checking my visa status page.

OK

Following on from my post yesterday: I've contacted site Admin, and they propose the following: either

1) Using a new user name to create and maintain a single thread from this point on, as described in my original post above - leaving parts one, two and three as separate threads; or

2) Merging all of these Cat 4 threads (Part 1, 2, 3 and now 4) and changing ownership of the thread from Tania Collins (as hers will be the earliest chronological post) to the new supervisor account referred to in 1) above; or

3) Leaving things as they are now, and when Flo gets the visa grant (which should be in a few weeks at current processing speeds!!!) and wants to pass the running of the thread onto someone else, a new thread will need to be created. (Part V, The Empire Strikes Back?)

What is the general opinion?

Shall we merge all of these threads into a new thread, and change ownership to a new account that can be legitimately passed on when the person running the thread moves on? I certainly found it annoying having to search all 3 threads for "medicals referred" - and it would be great to have everyone's contributions to this thread all consolidated into one - in my opinion.

Please let me know, and I can then pass this info on to the admin to make any necessary changes.

I don't know whether people should PM me their opinions to prevent off-thread items spamming everyone?

Regards

Patrick

Ah. I see that, buried away in the forum rules. It seems to be primarily geared toward preventing anonymous trolling, but I expect they wouldn't want to set a precedent.

I also see that all mods and admin are offline at the moment, but I'll keep an eye out and ask one when they come online.

Thanks

Hi all

With the impending move of Stephen to bigger and better things (who has done a brilliant job of continuing this thread), a thought occurs to me. I don't know if it's possible, or permissible on this forum, but having the same thread split into 3 parts (soon to be 4) makes searching historical things tricky.

What I propose is something like this:

Instead of having to create new threads every time one of the thread owners moves on, is it not possible to create a dummy account with a username like "Cat4Poster" or something, who can edit the first post in the thread, and the spreadsheet, and record PINKS and PURPLES etc.; but that person also has a separate personal account that they can use to post issues relating to their own CO and grant and doc requirements etc.?

That way, when the person behind these two usernames moves on to planning the Aus move, as we all hope to do soon, they can give the password to the "Cat4Poster" account to the person who wants to take over the thread, without 1) compromising the integrity of personal posts that may have been made (because the personal posts will have been made under the personal username) and 2) without having to create a new thread from scratch each time.

Is this possible? If so, why not try that, Florentinustay?

Just a thought.

Anyway, back to work, and checking my visa status page.

ugh, just checked my online status and my meds are still "outstanding" even though they've been received Monday am in Sydney (according to the carrier). It's now Wednesday in Sydney, wonder if my meds will be acknowledged :cry:

Has your status changed from "received" to finalised or met yet, Patrick??

Hi Sol2Oz

Sorry for the late reply - I've been in a meeting for the last 2 days solid.

Two of the three of us are showing "Health requirements finalised" and "Further medical results received", and one is showing "Health requirements outstanding" and "Further medical results referred".

It's been like this since Friday last week. I'm hoping the referred meds come back really soon. Still checking the website multiple times a day (as, I imagine, most of us in the waiting room are).

If my numbers are indicative, you'll only see them as finalised on or about Friday (if your CO updates like mine does).

Cheers

Hi Poeribbo -

 

Congratulations!! By the way, how long did it take for your medicals to be entered into the system after they got to Sydney? I ask because I tracked mine and it was "delivered" according to the carrier, but my documents checklist still read "outstanding".

Hi Sol2Oz

I can't talk to Poeribbo's experience, but I've had mine delivered in the last week.

My medicals were delivered to Sydney last Monday by the courier company, but my medicals were only marked as 'received' online last week Friday, so a 4-5 day period is what I experienced.

Hope this helps

THANK

GOD

IT'S

FRIDAY

 

Oh, and not forgetting........

 

TURN ME PURPLE!!!!!!

 

Woke up to a visa grant email from my CO.

WOOOOOHOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :jiggy::jiggy::jiggy::jiggy:

Congratulations, Mattster!

Fantastic news! Take the rest of the day off!

*Happy dance!*

 

Received an e-mail from our CO 6:43am (South Africa time) asking for PCC and Medicals.

I just picked up our PCC this morning and will be loading PRONTO!

Medicals have been done, just need a letter from my wife's doctor and they'll be on their way!

 

TURN US PINK PLEASE :ssign19:

 

*Happy dance!*

Congratulations, Erik!

Great news Once your medicals have been received, I'll be happy to give you a tour of the waiting room.

Cheers, and congrats again!

Holy cow! That's incredible!

Congratulations!

Hi all

We went for our medicals this past Monday, 23 April. We were all (me, wife and 5yr-old son) stripped down to undies - and both my and my son's bit were checked (don't know why... ). Height, weight, eyesight, ears and eyes checked, BP and urine tests were done for all of us, and X-rays and blood HIV tests were done on us adults.

There was a young girl in the waiting room who was applying for a USA visa with her mother - she had a skin TB test done (apparently a small device of some description is implanted in the skin for a few DAYS to determine whether TB is present), and I don't know what was involved, but she was screaming her head off for the 20 minutes prior to our examination - we had our hands full keeping our child calm with that going on - even I was feeling a bit queasy going in after that. The sound of a child screaming like that is really horrible. Just glad Aus don't require anything that from us!

The only panel doctor in Johannesburg is a bit of an oddball - always telling jokes and talking the hind leg off a donkey; and I found him seriously unprofessional. Anyway, after our 40-minute total exam, he required an additional report from our family GP which we submitted on Thursday this week, so I guess that means we're now in the waiting room! Could you please update the spreadsheet?

I'm really hoping there's nothing else DIAC require - all is showing as met on the website apart from our medicals.

The final wait is upon us! Here's hoping it's short-lived.

PatrickW

Congratulations! Fantastic news!!!

Minor update for my application - PCCs uploaded today 20/04/2012 (clear! Isn't it weird how getting a clear PCC feels like a relief, despite the fact that you know there is nothing that would indicate the contrary?), and medicals booked for Monday 23/04/2012.

Please update the spreadsheet, SH. Thanks

PatrickW

Hi everyone.

Just an update from our side. Our PCCs were finalised and collected today, and I'll upload them tomorrow.

Our medicals are booked for next Monday 23rd April, and it'll be directly uploaded from there.

Hoping our stay in the waiting room won't be too long!

PatrickW

Oh, and another thing - all documents are now reflecting 'met' except for the medicals. Go Team 4 for efficiency!

Woo!

It's far too early in the morning to crack the champagne, but we'll do it tonight, that's for sure!

PatrickW

Uh, guys.

I checked my online application status yesterday afternoon at around 23:00 Adelaide time - and no progress or CO - but I got an email at around 10:00 adelaide time this SATURDAY MORNING (OMG! They're working on weekends!) to ALLOCATE ME A TEAM 4 CO, BABY! COLOUR US PINK!!!

I'm utterly gobsmacked! I've applied for PCCs (they take around 6 weeks here in South Africa) and I'll book the medicals when we get back from holiday (we're going away until after Easter).

DIAC - you guys rock! Thanks!!!

What a way to start the day! :jiggy:

PatrickW