lounrich

I stand corrected - when I was backpacking (admittedly almost 2 decades ago!) you couldn't open a bank account before arriving on a WHV. Glad to hear it's a bit easier now.

I am definitely not trying to promote Transferwise for any Personal gain, I just genuinely found them good value with a very user-friendly interface. This is just my experience. As for the way they actually handle their money transactions, I'm afraid I must be a little more carefree with my cash, I just saw that they were appropriately regulated and trusted in that.

OP wants to buy AUD with GBP. With Transferwise this is done by local transfer within Australia. SWIFT payment would only be used if he was wanting to transfer AUD to GBP. But as I said before, other money exchange services are available.

The original OP was just asking about alternative money changers to compare/contrast and I was just giving him my experience. Each to their own. I have found Transferwise a delight but of course there are many other money exchange services available.

depends on your situation I suppose, if you are not in a hurry you could wait until AHPRA give you approval and then do modified assessment, which is cheaper I think but not sure if it's quicker. ANMAC take about 3 months for a full assessment. Also worth bearing in mind that once you have AHPRA approval you have to present at one of their offices within 12 months I think, to complete your registration, so there will be a time constraint of 12 months for you to get your ANMAC and visas done so you can fly out in time to complete your registration (unless you're going to make a special trip just to activate your registration). Also depends of your qualifications, if you're degree trained and/or anticipate no problems in getting registered then I'd say just go ahead and spend the money on the full ANMAC assessment asap, just to get the ball rolling a bit faster. However if you're unsure of getting AHPRA approval you might want to hold off until you've got AHPRA before committing any more money by starting ANMAC etc.

Have attached the ANMAC checklist I received when I lodged with them. As a disclaimer please note this is for the FULL assessment not the modified one, and was issued to me last January so I can't promise it's up to date, but it should help to give anyone looking to apply for full assessment what documents you need to start collecting. I don't know why they don't put this list on their website it would be so helpful to people thinking about applying! ANMAC Full Assessment Checklist.pdf ANMAC Full Assessment Checklist.pdf

Before you leave UK set up an account with a money transfer company, there are lots to choose from so you have to look at which can give you the best deal on fees and exchange rates. I have personally used Transferwise and have had a great service from them. You need to provide them with ID and home address before you can complete your first transfer (I used UK driving license and bank statement) so have scanned pdf's of these available ready for when you want to make your first transfer. If you're on a WHV you probably won't be able to open a bank account until you arrive so take enough cash to see you through the first couple of weeks and you can use credit cards and/or UK debit cards for big expenses (have to suck up the foreign transaction fee though!) Once you arrive in Australia open a bank account with one of the big banks (NAB, ANZ or Commonwealth, they have the most ATMs for if you're travelling about) and then you can transfer money in from home using your money transfer company. You'll most likely just need the details of your UK bank account (sort code and account number) and your Aussie bank account (BSB and account number) and you can start transferring. Transferwise also have an app so once you're set up you can do transfers using the app too which is easy for when you're travelling about. Hope this helps and happy travels!

Using Transferwise I didn't get charged any fees by my Australian bank (NAB - who by the way are fantastic) for receiving the transfer of money into my account. Only fee I got charged was by Transferwise, I think it was about £4.87 on £1000 transfer at £1.98 exchange rate.

I've been using Transferwise for mine and so far no problems, in fact I think its a great little service. Just transferred £1000 and only got charged less than £5 fee, and received roughly £$1.97 to each £1. Also very user friendly, once you've properly set up and verified your account transferring is a doddle, I have the app on my iPhone and can do transfers from there as well as on the laptop. The company is run/set up by the same people who run Skype.

I recently renewed my passport after being granted PR visa (my old passport was due to run out in July next year and I didn't want the hassle of renewing from over in Oz). I emailed a colour scanned copy of my old passport data page, a colour scan of my new passport data page and a completed 929 form (I printed out the pdf, completed it and scanned it back in as a pdf). I sent it to the email address from which I received my grant notification. Had an email today to say that they have assigned my new passport to my visa but that I should carry both my old and new passports when I travel to Australia as they do not generate a new visa grant notice or anything I think they just put a note on the electronic file stating the details of my new passport document. I only emailed them last week so the turnaround is quick. Hope his helps :-)

see my timeline I also applied on 60 points for nursing think we got in the first invite round after we put our EOI in but it was a good 2 weeks before the round was due.

My email was from Adelaide.gsm.team8@ blah blah blah so it was pretty obvious in my trash folder! I was checking my trash folder every day as knew the email would go in there! Not sure about form 80 as we were not asked for it and had no correspondence at all, just direct grant, lucky old me

Received notification of direct grant this morning, visa app was on 25/06/14 with medicals and PCC loaded shortly after. Must say even I was surprised it was so quick, think that's 10 weeks processing time! I was not expecting to hear anything for a couple of weeks yet. Adelaide team processed the app. Good luck to all those still waiting, I hope you are all on your way soon. Guess I better start getting some flights booked! :smile:

Hello All, Lodged on 25th June, just awaiting CO. Medicals and PCC frontloaded. Just a waiting game for a CO now. I have to stop myself checking Immiaccount every day, I know I'll get an email if they do try to contact me but it's just irresistible to keep checking!

Thank you, that will save me a trip!