CatMartin

Thanks Candygirl, we are having a nightmare time with ASA. Not replying to our messages, not answering our questions, and not giving us our TRA number. We arent happy with them at all and on personal experience would not recommend them to anyone but I guess everyone has their own different experiences. So we are now getting MARA involved. Joy. The last thing we need. LOL to your message, I do feel we have sent everything bar the kitchen sink, but having more is better than less. What does your OH do in the security industry if you dont mind me asking.

Thanks guys so much. Think Im being lied to from ASA (and before I get sued, this is only speculation from ourselves, lol!!). Said they applied for my skills assessment in January, and still havnt heard anything back (it isnt even a complicated skills assessment) and whenever we ask, we always get a "theres a backlog" and more crap, then the other day we complained to them and they said they that they have had to relodge it because the department who deals with all assessments have changed to something else (a different name or something). Thats one of the many excuses they have come up with. Its a nightmare, all this money and it looks like we are going to have to change. Everyone can get into this country and we cant bloody well get out!!

Im having so much problems with my agent ASA Group, and so am looking at moving, someone told me about Go Matilda, just wondering what everyones experience of them are? Thanks

I've just sent my 3RD message to ASA since 23rd September and got no reply! Then last night I sent a very, very strongly worded letter, no hello, no thank you, basically, the words NOW and TAKING THIS FURTHER were used. Then this morning a woman called Shirley replied saying the CEO is looking into the matter immediately and will respond asap.somehow the likelihood of this happening doesn't look that good. Can you fire ur immigration agent whilst the skills assessment had been lodged. I've always been under the impression that you can't lodge a visa app whilst one is going through. Any advice would be great. X

im having THE EXACT same problem. apparently our skills assesment was lodged jan/feb 2012 and still we havnt heard anything. keep getting, "we havnt heard back yet". how is all yours getting on with them?

p.s we are ordinary brummies ......not ruperts from oxford...class comment!!! Ile be using that one!

sorry to hear that Azmir. You think going for an agent would be the best thing as they would really know their way around and help as much as possible, when in actual fact its the complete opposite. The email ive written my agent is a very strongly worded, 'i want this, i want that' as they havnt even given me a TRA case number!! Ive done some investigating now into ASA Group, and I have no doubt that its a legitimate company, but am feeling very let down at the moment, especially now am reading all these comments about times and stuff. and now that im thinking about it, ive been abit too soft, thinking, "im sure they know what they are doing,". my husband wants us to sack ASA off and just do it ourselves, but we cant at the moment as we have a skills visa going through at the moment, apparently. and you cant have 2 going through at once

that would be great benny blueboy. just reluctant to seek other agent as paid in full for application and loose all that money. then again, worth it for our dream. my husband has applied for 176 visa, classed as an electrical instrument engineer-general, which is on skills list. but what we are applying for is still at skills assesment stage! the more im reading these replies to this thread, the more im having a panic attack!!

ive just sent an email which basically came out as, 'what the hell'? i know hardly anything. ive asked on a previous occassion about the 176 changeover and got this response The visas mentioned have been replaced from 01 July 2012. The visa that you were eligible to apply for before (176) is now called subclass 190. So apart from the change in the name, it has not actually affected you. im just banging my head against a brick wall. ive asked for a full breakdown on my TRA number, which stage exactly we are with TRA, if they are working from a particular month. my husband is so mad about the whole situation, im finding it hard to stop him from writing something alot worse to our agent ASA Group!

ive spoken to them many times, and just keep getting that theres a backlog due to huge influx of applications late last year. but 9/10 months seems to be abit extreme.

hi guys, anyone have any idea how long it took their 176 skills assesment to be processed? i applied in january via an agent, and still waiting to hear back from TRA if ive passed or not.

like i said, it isnt something im planning, im not even preggers, just wondering thats all. Gratz on the baby JoandJon!

just a question, not something Im wanting to do, but my friend asked me the other day that if i was temporary visa eg tourist visa/1 year travel/work visa, and if i was pregnant and gave birth, would it give me the right to stay in Oz, as my baby would be australian?

My husband is classed as an electrical instrument engineer (he is an alarm engineer), he has 20 years experience and work references for all, as well as certificates in his career for the passing certain things. he has done an informal apprenticeship, but that was 20 years ago. the examining body that provided that course has been taken over about 10 times, and so they have details of the course, but have no record of anyone being on it. theres a letter he received after completing his course saying they are just waiting for the log books to be signed off so certificates can be issued. Now our migration agents (ASA Group) have said that TRA turned our skills assessment down as there wasnt any proof that the course had been done. So we went back to the company, they went through a load of things with my husband and were satisified that he has indeed completed the course. They have since issued a letter saying all the things that was covered in the course and that despite they have no receord of my husband being on the course they are satisifed he completed it. we have passed that to our migration agent and our skills assessment has been relodged. I just thought it was strange, with teh amount of my husbands career experience that it would be turned. we have been contacting our agent about 3 times a month asking for updates, but they cant tell us anything about our case until they hear back from TRA. I did think we were being messed around from our agents, timescale now-9 months since submitted (the second time), however, after reading peoples posts here, looks like we are about average!

thanks so much, just getting really frustrated with it, especially when you feel like youre the only one who seems to be taking forever!!