evets

It would be nice to hear some of the reasons you are leaving and moving back to the UK or indeed moving to another country. It is nice to read all the success stories, and well done if everything has worked out and indeed worked out for the better. Some industries and locations in Australia, can be a real winner especially coming from the UK. For others especially in WA who rode the wave of the mining boom and now feeling the aftermath hit pretty hard. For me, it was the option of retrenchment and facing a job market over 40 in a niche role, in an industry which is more and more being offshored or outsourced. Salaries are stagnant and cost of living with the ever rising housing market is making Australia an expensive country to live in, let alone take a holiday locally. The amount of people applying for jobs and the ever increasing migrants are putting a strain on the job market. Ask your next foreign taxi driver about there qualifications. I am not trying to create a negative thread as everyone's story is different and reading numerous post's here and other expat forum sites, some are very heart breaking to read.

Nice plan And good to give your kids options in the future. After 7 years myself, Xmas still feels weird without snow. Suppose it brings back child hood memories.

And if you can get it at Masters, big discounts as trying to flog everything believe 50% off. I too was shocked at the prices compared to what I remembered from the UK.

A BIG change from whats it called.. Cumbernauld. I too was brought up there. I hope you will miss the town centre, as you will never find anything like it again

So true. Shame really. Easier to get a divorce than to make a marriage work.

Yep helps loads. Sorry to hear about your circumstances, you have had a really tough time Moving between countries really makes you assess all the stuff you have accumulated and what is really important. How much of a hoarder you can be and your spending habits on buying crap for the sake of it! Planning for retirement when moving over 40 or 50 and having to start new pensions from scratch, is a tough call as will you built up enough capital in the time period. I truly hope your move works out for you and you can get back on your feet. I am in the process of trying to downsize myself because of another relocation and looking at everything, thinking now why did I buy it.

Your first 6 months salary is a bit on the low side and that is including you 50 hour week. The $35 while still lowish but a 50 hour boosts it up. Standard working week is around 37.5, so would you be paid overtime rates after that which would make a big difference? Both salaries are very doable especially if staying in shared accomodation. If you are looking to buy could be a different matter but depends on how far out you would want to stay and if you choose West over East. If you are looking at shared accomodation then anything in the inner Melbourne suburbs would be ideal, it all depends on what you are looking for. Is a car/van required for your job as this may help decide your location or at least certains areas? You would also need to consider parking, as if sharing others may/will have a car a already secured the prime garage or parking spot. Look at Richmond, Fitzroy, Brunswick, North Melbourne, South Yarra otherwise if you have a car then look further out and different areas. Suburbia ie outer suburbs is vastly different to outer suburbs in the UK, and pretty much a culture shock. How much travel would you do on a day to day basis or is this an office job? If the former, traffic in certain parts of Melbourne can be a nightmare, rush hour is also not too good. For the size of Melbourne, it offers so much. Sometimes for certain things better than a lot of the major cities in the UK even London. It is very livable and has a very laid back cafe lifestyle. The boardwalk has been refampted and is a star attraction. Just do not expect it to be easy to get to during the weekends unless you stay walking distance. Traffic and parking. The city centre is going through a massive transformation, then again so are the suburbs. Not sure what part of the UK you are coming from but cost of day to day living may shock you, unless coming from London, even then I still suspect it would be cheaper in London for a large majority of things. The weather in Melbourne can be 4 seasons in one day, maybe more but no snow in winter just have to deal with the odd 40+ in summer. It all really depends on what you are looking to move for or gain.

Agreed, from what I understand it is pretty dire for IT. Then again the same could/can be said for WA and QLD. Australia is facing a few tough, many, years in its coming future. Hopefully the dream that is still being sold in the UK reflects that!!! Being a high cost centre is really not helping with major corps shutting down shop for cheaper offshore cost centres. The irony is they, cheaper cost centres, moving to AU for better paid work to find there positions offshored and end up driving taxis to pay the bills. IT positions have really turned into a niche role in Australia. But I suspect this is much the same in many Western countries.

Nice place, quiet though and depending on you career you may struggle to find work and end up moving back to the UK or to one of the larger cities in Australia. Shame really as housing affordable, still.

Agreed, it would have been so much easier on the family if you made the move many years earlier. Your eldest child is the one who will feel this the most, IMO. Aside from offering your children a better future, Brexit could be a god send for the UK or not. Only time will tell. What are your reasons for moving, you appear to be in a very good position. Do you want to move your self or is this just for the kids?

What part of the UK are you in and what part of Australia would you be looking to move to? You do not mention if you have spent any time in Oz, aside from validating your visa. Some parts of Australia are a bit of a cultural shock and depending if you looking at Sydney or Melbourne, you may be shocked at the house prices. Have you researched the job market here and looked at what salary ranges are on offer? Trying to get in a new job market at 50, you may be lucky depending on what you do. Australia is in a bit of a lul at the moment since the mining boom is over, and the places with the most jobs would be Sydney or Melbourne. Lots of new immigrants also, adding to the competition. The job market for graduates also is pretty tough and competitive at the moment. If your kids looking for a trade route, these are also hard to come by. Are you a homeowner, would you sell up or rent it out? Does your OH and the kids want to make the move. Your eldest would more than likely feel the move the most, in the last few years of high school and depending if they want to go to Uni, lots of studying for the grades. The education system is different over here and they would have to adjust. Would Oz offer a better future for you and your family. It is really hard to say, everyone is different. Say you are coming from certain parts of London to Melbourne, I would say a better quality of life, much safer, people talk to you on public transport. Your children having dual citizenship is a big bonus, as it provides them the option of staying in Australia or going back to the UK to work either permanently or for a few years. The wages are generally higher in Australia, but so is the cost of living. Other things to consider is healthcare and the additional costs of taking out private healthcare, starting a new pension fund, and the overall cost of moving and getting settled in. Also if you are close to your family and parents, how often would you want to go back on visits. Flights around xmas time, for a family of 4 would probably be in excess of $10k.

Been with iinet for the last 3 years, and previously on and off for 3 years, apart from one major outage all good, even though they have been bought out by TPG. Not in a NBN zone, so cannot comment. Less competition here in Oz, so higher prices. I have Telstra for mobile, work provided and the customer service sucks. For some reason I am in a black zone and cannot get 4G even though I am only 10km from the CBD.

Sheesh Real Estate Agent on the SOL. Sorry but that is ludicrous, no disrespect. It is not like you are a doctor, nurse, engineer which takes years of training. A 5 day course in Australia to qualify! I even had to double the SOL then found out it is on the CSOL, shocking to say the least. The housing market is crazy here at the moment, what do you or could offer an agency something special that they would sponsor you and fork out thousands for a visa and relocation costs that they could not find locally? Then again I see a number of British recruitment agents who have been sponsored, again suspect.

Based on another thread: [h=1]What have you done today to get yourself to OZ?[/h] Curious to what you have done, are doing and why wanting to leave? Note: I too am in the process of relocating, not because I dislike Oz just life happened and my circumstances changed but not moving back to the UK, this time NA.

I have used iinet and TPG. TPG was good and cheap at the time but customer support a little dire, so when I moved home I switched back to iinet. iinet good customer support but now owned by TPG. Both offer nbn, and after reading the new reports over the last few months it has turned into a bit of an expensive farce. I have had very few issues with both of them, one long outage with iinet though, which boiled down to a problem at a switch box and a cable touching one of my neighbours. Any other issues with iinet, they have been very good and offer callback instead of hanging on a phone line waiting for your place to get to the top. Both do contracts but you do get hit with a high connection/startup fee for this luxury. As Skani mentioned, I also pay monthly using my CC. Seems to be a popular choice here. Not sure if it is due to the way salary payments are made, some people bi monthly others monthly, which for me is around the middle of the month. So the day I get paid can vary by 1,2 or 3 days. Consider what your usage was in the UK, do you really need unlimited?? As usually always comes with a fair usage policy. iinet will allow you to start on the lowest plan and if you need to can upgrade. Downgrading of course incurs a fee. If you are not heavily reliant on the internet, I am as I work from home and having access to customer support essential, then TPG would be a decent choice. $50/month with unlimited internet if you are not going to be using the landline much, which is pay as you go.

True, good point.

Hookturn, Maybe contact these guys, they have a number of WFH options. https://www.pythian.com/career-opportunities/ Also have your heard of this firm: http://www.uxc.com.au/ They do not have anything posted at the moment, but you could contact and discuss.

Hi Natasha, I cannot comment on your hubbies line of work, I am in a different industry but also seeing a downturn and lots being either offshored or outsourced. But from I have picked up on different forums the manufacturing industry in Australia has taken a hit(Australia has/is becoming to expensive to hire people and too costly to make anything), just as the mining boom has died and the jobs in WA have faded away. Lots of people in the same boat, some even returning to the UK as could not find work. Have you checked out Melbourne or Sydney to see what the job market is like. These two cities appear to be have the strongest job market in Australia at present, also have you considered Canberra(not sure if manufacturing jobs would be good here since more a government place)? Has your partner considered a different line of work and retraining, bit extreme I know?

Not sure what visa you are coming across on OP. I came on a 457 and joined Commonwealth, as they I believe are the only bank that would give a 457 visa holder a CC. Have a chat to them when you move over.

As I am looking into this more, I was going to use a company called send my bag(works out cheaper than excess baggage), but found TNT do this service kinda similar called economy express delivery. It appears to work out a bit cheaper, 3 medium boxes, for more stuff than the box and bag I was going to send. It would take around a week. https://www.tnt.com/express/en_au/site/home/how-to-ship-parcel/shipping-services/express-parcel-delivery.html Move cube from seven seas may work for you: http://www.sevenseasworldwide.com/en-au/moving/movecube/international/ The TNT website, you can input you home and destination, put in the number of boxes and sizes and they will give you a price. Move cube, you can do an online quotation to get an idea. A shared container will take longer usually as they wait till its full before shipping.

I should add, since I moving the opposite way from you and also facing the same dilemma. Other expat sites I use, I see similar questions asked and by myself also. TV - lets assume you have a flatscreen. You would need an external TV digital box and a transformer, well for my TV I would need one for Canada. Work out if the cost of replacing it is worth the cost of shipping, but they are not bulky items. Another thing I found when I used the digital TV boxes, they would not scale properly with my TV, so in the end ditched them. Not sure if it was because they where no name brands. My DVD player supports both 110 and 240V, but these are regional so you may not be able to play DVD's bought in Australia. Anything with a motor in it, and depending on the wattage will need a higher rated transformer ie things like Hoovers, Sowing Machines, Juicers, Power tools and the like. Because of the different power frequencies I have read sowing machines from the UK run slightly slower in Canada. I have seen a large number of people taking their expensive hoovers and other electrical items to Canada due to the cost of replacing them after they move. I will be taking a number of items with me and will buy a couple of transformers and then wait till they die. But the downside is I will need to wait up to 2 months without them Some other things to consider, maybe think of some power extension cables, power strips which could mean you do not have to buy too many transformers or plug adapters.

Not sure if this helps or not, since I am moving from Melbourne AU to Toronto CA, and not sure what part of the US you are in. But it may give you a rough idea. This is what I have been quoted by the company organising my shipping(part of a relocation through my company): 5.5CBM - $7717 USD 8.85CBM - $8629 USD 20 foot container, not shared, 6 - 8 weeks transit. I did seek out some quotes myself from other companies, some quite a bit cheaper but then realised they where shared containers and could take much longer to arrive depending on how long it took to fill the container. Others not that far off or a bit more expensive, but that was because they charged for the full 20 foot container and not what space I took up. I still find the whole think odd as did not get any real helpful answer from my shipping company.

WOW that is nearly as bad at Ontario in Canada. I tried one online compare site, and it came back between CA$5000 to $7000. I nearly had a heart attack. Think it would depend on the number of accidents and claims made, Sydney higher population, more cars on the road.

I called them after 3 weeks and got the same response.

Any ideas how long the approval letter can take, I am at 5 weeks since I sat the test. Glen Eira, Melbourne.