Bella89

Congrats on your engagement! I agree with Marissa about considering the prospective marriage visa, especially if you are engaged. On the prospective marriage visa, you'll be allowed to come to Australia essentially to get married. You'll still have to apply for the partner visa after being married but it'll probably be a bit easier for you, especially if you have your son with you. I'm going through this process too and I have a lot of anxiety about making my relationship DeFacto enough. What I worry about is that they assess you on the strength of your original application, so even if you came to Australia, applied for the 820 VISA and then married your partner during the 2 year waiting period and added the marriage certificate to your application, they could ignore the marriage and reject you. The migration agent I spoke to said that he's knows of people who it has happened to. This application is deliberately difficult. I've been with my partner for more than a year, and I registered my relationship in QLD for good measure, but my partner and I are discussing delaying our application until December to make sure we have the strongest evidence we possibly can, which means I get to be stuck on the tourist visa until then. The thing that makes me anxious about relying on a registered relationship to mask a weak application is that they're so easy to get that I just don't want to put all my stock into it and still end up going to appeal. Especially now they've increased the price to almost $8k.

Technically you can only apply for a tourist visa in Australia if your intention is to be a tourist. If you intend to enter the country on a tourist visa in order to apply for another VISA then you might have issues entering into Australia. You'll be asked these questions on the landing card before you get into Australia. You have to specify the number of days you intend to stay and there is an option to say "I'm moving permanently". It's possible that you might get questioned on the border and sent back. It also might flag something if you come into OZ on a tourist visa and then immediately apply for deFacto. From my understanding, and I am NOT a migration expert so please correct me, but my understanding is that you can come to Australia as a Tourist and then apply for the de Facto if your plans change. I'm not there in the process yet but it is something they might question you on. Is there any reason you can't apply for the offshore VISA? that seems to have a shorter waiting time than the onshore stuff.

There are other relatively easy things you include too, like nominating each other as the beneficiary on your supers, if not done so already. Making sure that ATO, medicare etc is registered to the same address and highlighting when payments are made, making sure your names are on things like car insurance, contents insurance, travel insurance, health insurance etc.

Sorry, I've only just seen this response. That's interesting about the bridging visa because when we spoke to a migration agent last week he said he had clients who had used the tourist visa multiple times in order to accrue more time on their application. Fortunately I was fine coming back in. I actually got questioned more when I returned from Indonesia after being on the 417, but that may have been because I was with my partner this time and we were coming in from Vanuatu.

Thank you. I've talked to my partner about my concerns and I think we're both going to feel more comfortable with the help of a migration agent. Besides our case might be a little more complex because my partner is a little bit well known in Australia and we've had a bit of media attention on the relationship which adds to the stress of the application and part of the reason I sometimes feel that Australia and I have a bit of a tense relationship.

Ah great point. I actually had them done for work because I worked in government and finance so have them to hand. It made getting a job in my industry so much easier when I was on the 417 visa. The more I sleuth through this forum, the more nervous I'm getting about proving that my relationship is "de Facto", if people can be refused when they're married, how can I prove that my relationship is genuine? Anyone can open a joint bank account and put names on bills etc. It only cost $50 to register the relationship in QLD and all we needed were our passports and to sign a form. This anxiety is normal, right?

Thank you for your response. That’s annoying but not the end of the world, and I guess gives me 3 months to gather and prepare the evidence. I’ll probably post more about details about the application separately. I didn’t want to go off topic too much.

Hi, I'm new to the forum and I'm sorry if this question has been asked a million times before but I'm a bit confused with the information out there: My tourist visa is multiple entry and lasts for a year and allows me to stay in Australia for 90 day increments. If I apply for a 420 de Facto, will the bridging Visa kick in after 90 days or a year? Also on that note, does that 90 day period "reset" when you leave and re-enter Australia? Context: I met my boyfriend while I was on a WHV, when that expired we took a holiday together and then I came back to OZ on a multiple entry tourist visa in order to visit some friends. We're now in Vanuatu together and returning to Oz tomorrow. Initially I'd hoped to go to Japan for a little while but Boyfriend has a mortgage with his sister and after a lot of discussion, it's not feasible for him to leave (as he's a first time buyer, he has to live at the address for 12 months after purchase), and as it turns out, I don't think I can go without him. It looks as though applying for a 820 is going to be the best option for us at this time. Fortunately I was kind of aware that this might be a possibility and started creating the paper trail back in Feb so I could feasibly submit the application in a couple of weeks. I have all my police checks for the UK and Australia sorted because I worked in finance and government, the only thing I might need to get updated is the health check (and wills? I'm 29 and I've never given getting a will a second thought before!). I want to get a migration agent but we can't afford it on just one income so I want to get working rights ASAP (like everyone else I imagine). are there any other pieces of info I can include in the application in the short term? In addition to personal docs, I'm listed on the insurance. All my Australian tax, bank, medicare details are registered to his address (as he's my contact in oz) and we registered the relationship as an insurance back in feb, but we're not married or engaged yet. Are there any other "quick wins" that you could recommend?