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Hi All, Any advice or opinions would be great. I'm a plumber and my wife and I we're originally planning to go to Brisbane on a 175 skilled independent pr visa, but with skills dropping off the modl we didn't want risk waiting for our visa to be processed after almost all the other visas so we decided to speed things up by going state sponsored. Only thing is QLD state are not sponsoring plumbers so we decided to go for perth WA instead. We really would prefer to settle in brisbane and I've seen posts on here saying people just jump state if when they get there. I believe for state sponsorship we'll have a moral obligation to stay in WA for two years which ok, we'd like to honour if WA give us the opportunity to speed our process up, but then if we still wanted to settle in brisbane after that, we'd have to mess around with my trade registration again in QLD. Is anybody on here who has jumped state? (wont tell honest lol) or has anyone tried and been caught out? I'm sure Perth will be great if we stick with it, but why move the other side of the world and still really not be where we want? Any thoughts? Regards Martin

We are currently in the process of moving to Melbourne and I researched which shipping company to use for weeks. There was only one company which appeared to have no complaints and very good reviews so I went with them. I arranged everything to the n'th detail and everything went fine up to and including collection. We were told to expect it to take 9-13 weeks before our stuff was delivered, so we reckoned on 11 weeks average. The packers even told us they were shipping quite regular so it wouldn't be long before it was off. Anyway, it's now 5 weeks and the company still can't even give me an estimate of when they think it might go. They stopped responding to my emails, even though I sent a complaint to the area manager it was ignored. When I phone them, I get the usual excuses of "the person who looks after the container is on holiday" etc. I can't believe they only have one person doing that in a major relocation company. They are always just wating on some little bit of information, but then come back with no answer. Am I worring uneccessarily? Is it fairly typical for it to take this long to ship? I can't believe they can't work out how much space is left in the container and what goods they still have to collect. Also, I can't see how it's going to be within 13 weeks as it's been 5 weeks already, with still no estimate, 6 weeks on the ship, 2 weeks + customs etc. No chance! It seems that once these companies have your stuff and your money, they've got you over a barrel, just when you need them to do what you paid them for. Our biggest reason for leaving the UK is this type of shoddy service, where they don't give a monkeys about their customers. Ironic that the last thing I'll ever pay for in the UK will give me poor service yet again.:mad: I won't name the company just yet (unless people want to know), in case they still meet 13 weeks by some miracle, but I will if it turns out to be very late. Although we're not shipping furniture, we'll still have to buy lots of duplicate stuff in Oz that is being shipped.

Can't believe it! Not sure where we're going, (hoping to move to Perth) but they might send us to Darwin or Queensland! Still, it's a free trip down under, so not complaining!! Positive skills assesment back, (Welfare Worker), waiting for IELTS results, then will complete visa application online. All looking good at the moment. We're on facebook: Gary Ward (leeds network) and Helen Ward (Leeds Network)