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Finally! Our Australian Migration Journey saw its end today (3,547 days since I first arrived on a student visa!!) Our timeline (Wife and I had exactly the same time-line): Eligible for Citizenship: 04/04/2017 Citizenship Applied: 04/04/2017 Test Date: 25/07/2017 Approval Letter Date: 01/08/2017 Ceremony Date: 30/10/2017 Applied Passports: 31/10/2017 Enrolled to Vote: 03/11/2017 Passport Received: 07/11/2017 Thank you everyone who assisted, stood-by and advised. To those are waiting, hang tight. It is totally worth it. All The Best!

Yes,@kkumar, citizenship applications can be made online. We have been inundated with enquiries since the 18th. The trick is to make an application as soon as you are eligible making sure that your application is complete with all the necessary paperwork the way the department requires it to be. Any additional request for information or documentation will delay your process. All the best! MARN: 1685881 Anything posted in this forum is not migration advise, the information shared is general. To seek specific advice, PM me. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Abhishek, BREAKING NEWS: a win for multicultural Australia I wanted you to know straight away, just moments ago, the Senate here in the Australian Parliament threw out the Government’s changes to Australia citizenship laws. That means they have said no to the university level English test. It means they have said no to the three year additional wait that was going to cause some people to wait more than ten years before they got to become Australian citizens. Because of the university English test, some people were going to live here their entire working lives and were never going to be able to become Australian citizens. So right now, we’ve just had the win that you’ve been campaigning for. I want to give you full credit, because let’s not pretend this was done by members of Parliament. This was done by an extraordinary community activism that you were part of and you made sure that you never wasted a conversation. This will make a real difference to the lives of people who will become good Australian citizens. This will make a massive difference in people’s lives. And will guarantee that a whole lot of people who were never going to hear the words ‘Welcome home’ will now be able to make a pledge of commitment to Australia. Now the Government may well have another go at this. The Government may well come back and try again. So, if you are eligible for Australian citizenship under current law my advice is don't waste time. Get your application in under current law. Get your application in before the government tries to do this again. I was Minister for Citizenship for a time and when I was, I got to write the message that was read out of every citizenship ceremony and the message that I had finished with the words ‘Welcome home.’ We want to be able to say ‘welcome home’ to you. Those of you who are ready to become good Australian citizens, those of you who are ready to make your pledge of commitment to Australia. Get your applications in. Make the application go through the existing test. Make your pledge of commitment to this country and the Labor Party will be very, very proud to say back to you ‘welcome home’. No doubt the government will come back. There will be another attempt at this. But right now enjoy the victory, enjoy the moment and know your activism made this happen. Congratulations. Tony.

Congratulations@Felix123. I remember our days huffing and puffing from 186 forum. Your anthem bit got me cracking and made my Saturday. My family and I are going to attend our ceremony on the 30th. Mrs has started shopping for the right dress! MARN: 1685881 Anything posted in this forum is not migration advise, the information shared is general. To seek specific advice, PM me. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Hi Raul, I didn’t realise that you were the RMA who had provided the quote. I’ll back off as you provided them with a quote first Apologies and All the best! Abhishek - MARN: 1685881.

Well, I’m a migration agent now post my 186 grant! I’m a principal of the firm and would be more than happy to assist. Once again, feel free to drop a private message and I would be happy to help.

Hi! May be we can assit! All fees except for the Management fee will remain the same. We charge Management fee of $4,500 plus GST. PM me to find out more! We are a team of migration agents. Based in Brisbane (city - Eagle Street)

The rules have been the same for ages. You don’t have to be a citizen to be a migration agent. It helped me immensely to be a registered migration agent while applying. I knew exactly what and how an application was supposed to be made. How it was going to be processed and by when. Since I have many clients who use my services to apply for their citizenship application, I could also track the timeline! As far as special preference for MARA agents in terms of processing time is concerned, there is no difference. The processing time is the same. Just like when you lodge a tax return. But, when you use a professional, you can rest assure that your application is presented in its best capacity to the department (if your agent is competent, most are) this can result in cutting down significant time if the department requests further documents. Especially when an application is self-lodged incorrectly or is incomplete. Not a bad idea to put my MARAN in the signature but I don’t want anything I say here to be construed as Migration advice. Just general information. May be I will! Thanks!! MARN: 1685881 Anything posted in this forum is not migration advise, the information shared is general. To seek specific advice, PM me. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Laura, that is not the case. Applications lodged prior to 20 April are still being or have already been processed. 18 October is the deadline for the government to decide on the bill and put it up for a vote. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sweet, I had thought as much. Thanks Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

One can be a migration agent if one is a permanent resident! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

LOL - Weather is not the only thing we’ve got the upper hand on Also, being a migration agent myself helps! Hope you’d join us in celebrating soon. Talking about passports, the ceremony invitation letter “recommends” that we wait for 10 business days before making the passport application. Has anyone else had that on their letter? Wondering what is the connection there. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

In Year 2015 - total 35,780 ENS 186 visas were granted. That is roughly 2981 visas every month - approx 99 visas every day! Remember, these are just grant numbers. Actual number of applications are higher. Reports, statistics and trends are all online available publicly on DIBP's website. Congratulations to those who got their PR approved recently. All the best to those who are waiting.

Importing your application does not affect your application in anyway. The only reason your MA might be a little annoyed is because of the fact that sometimes when applicants import their applications, they toy with documents. Which takes longer for them to fix. If you talk to them and explain that the only reason you imported is so that you can keep an eye on the application, they might be fine. You also sign a form 956 when you let MA handle your application on your behalf. They have an obligation in that case to make sure that they have a single channel which they can control with the department immigration. When you open another channel, they may not have a total control over the communication that you send to the department. When it comes to threatening, they can end the appointment to represent the client, if they think that they can no longer act in your best interest. Check your client service agreement for this. See what recourse you have. Lodging a complain may not be a good idea. OMARA can assist you only "after" you have exhausted all your avenues to settle your grievances with your Migration Agent. Make sure all your communication with MA is in writing. Not sure if you have, but in case if you haven't, read this: https://www.mara.gov.au/media/152338/consumer_guide_english.pdf Hope that helps. I have been away from the forum for some time. Congratulations to all those who have been granted their residencies recently. All the best to those who are still waiting.

I'm from Mumbai but bought up in the Goan part of Mumbai. I can speak a bit of Konkani but understand all of it hope you're enjoying your PR

Congratulations, all the best. khoob soro piyet baslelo?

Congratulations, all the best.

Congratulations, hope your visa comes soon, all the best.

Congratulations, hope visa comes in soon.

If this was meant for me - I'm sorry that you can't read long threads. But there is a solution to it. If you can't- don't!

That well may be in your case. It may not be so in many other applicant's case. Not a good idea to paint a picture with one colour. Let's face it, if these things were easy to do, not a lot of migration agents would have been able to thrive in their business like they do. Not everyone's case is as straight forward. Not everyone is comfortable putting their own application together and submitting documents on time. Not everyone would like to hold their breath and wonder if what they did was/is right. I am not trying to argue or steer the conversation in favour of migration agents. I am trying to contradict the statement that said "migration agents are useless" - they are not. I know first hand how useful they are or can be. I don't understand the concept of "preparing documents" how can you prepare one's document? Don't you simply provide these to your agent? If you meant that you have to prepare letters and submissions, than unfortunately your migration agent isn't competent enough or you should demand your migration agent to prepare these for you. rest, you have to prove. For example, you provide your passport, you don't prepare it! Your employer may be able to provide all documents but what if there is an enquiry? For example, if a case officer wants to know if there is a genuine need of the position being nominated, how is your employer going to tackle that? There are special provisions in the law that states what can be deemed as genuine and what can't. For that, you need someone who understand the term genuine needs to answer that query. This is how an application decision is delayed. If proper documents are not provided at the time of the application, the case officer can come back asking for them or might seek further explanation which results in the delay. Once again, I am not saying all MAs are as competent, but that is when we need to be wise enough to select the one that we know will act in our best interest. Kudos to you for being able to prepare your application, being able to submit documents and receiving a decision well within the time frame. Not everyone however, will be this competent and for them, there are specialists - Migration Agents.

I am sorry, but I don't agree. Migration law is very complex. For example, there are requirements that need to be met at the time of application and then there are requirements at the time of decision. There are also certain validity requirements that are not so easy to understand by simply reading the DIBP website. Nomination application requires a lot of checks including training, turnover, personnel, financials, market salary rate etc. Visa too is not as straight forward as it looks. Also, having an agent let's you concentrate on your work and gives you that extra peace of mind knowing that someone who has studied specifically to lodge visas have lodged your application. It is like letting a certified electricians or plumber work your house. You would be able to sleep peacefully knowing that your house won't blow up in the middle of the night. Now, there are always exceptions. Some Migration Agents are better than the others. Some migration agents do not have enough experience to deal with a certain kind of applications or may not have kept themselves up-to-date with the latest legislation (though they are required to do so.) and it totally depends on us - the clients, to choose the right kind of migration agent for our application. A very good test to see if your migration agent is good or not is to see how many clients they handle in a month, how busy they are and what is their success rate. Ask them for referrals. Say that you would like to talk to a few of their clients before you decide to take up their services. It is a buyer's market, you can choose which service to buy and from whom. Congratulations to those who got their PR and all the best to those waiting.

Congratulations and all the best

Congratulations on Nom Approval. Hopefully visa will follow suit soon.

Congratulations and all the best