Migration Agent Problems - Please Read

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Hi All

 

A thread has started on British Expats about a Migration Agency in Edinburgh. The thread is here:

 

trouble with agency - Visa Connection, Edinburgh : British Expat Discussion Forum

 

As far as I know it is only a small Agency, so it is very unlikely that many - if any - Poms in Oz members are also affected by whatever is going on or not going on at the moment.

 

Alan Collett and George Lombard are both Registered Migration Agents with stacks of experience. They are on top of the situation and will help anyone who needs help. I know them both and I can assure you that you would be in very safe hands with either Alan or George. A Registered Migration Agent in Edinburgh is also on standby to help anyone who needs it.

 

To contact Alan or George, the details are below and Alan is based at Go Matilda's office in Melbourne:

 

Contact Us | George Lombard Consultancy Pty. Ltd.

 

Go Matilda - Your Gateway to Australia - Contact and Feedback

 

However, if any Poms in Oz members are using the Agency in question, please be assured that there is no cause for panic. DIAC are aware of the problems and RMAs are ready to contact DIAC for you if you do not want to do that yourselves.

 

I can now reveal that one of our Poms in Oz members, deanrm, had a torrid time with this agency recently. Their application for a subclass 136 visa had been refused by DIAC about 6 weeks before deanrm discovered that there was a problem. However the ASPC were superb, encouraged them to make a new application for a subclass 175 visa quickly, processed it quickly and the result was that deanrm did not have to re-do their meds or police checks.

 

Recovering the money that they spent on the Agency's fees and on DIAC's fees for the refused sc 136 application is proving to be more complex.

 

Somebody on the BE thread says that s/he is preparing a case for the Small Claims Court in respect of whatever happened with their own application. I would urge more haste and less speed with that idea. I think the Agency in question could be a limited liability company, and if so it may be incorporated under Scottish Law rather than under the law of England & Wales. It has certainly been trading in Scotland.

 

I am not Scottish-qualified and I do not know anything about the law or the courts in Scotland. My advice would be to contact the Trading Standards Officer in Edinburgh before considering litigation, because one would need to find out whether any proceedings should be commenced in Scotland rather than in England and Wales:

 

The City of Edinburgh Council - Trading Standards

 

I am waiting to hear from the MIA/MARA about deanrm's situation. As I understand it, the Agency in Scotland has been jointly managed by a Registered Migration Agent who lives and works in England, and by an MIA Affiliate Member based in Scotland. Anyone who has had dealings with the lady in Scotland will know who she is from the list below:

 

MIA - Affiliates

 

I STRESS that NO other MIA Affiliate Members are involved.

 

At the moment it is not clear whether the MIA has any powers to regulate the activities of MIA Affiliate Members, or any disciplinary powers in relation to services provided by them. The MARA is the registration and regulatory arm of the MIA, but it would seem that the Australian legislation underpinning the business of Registered Migration Agents might not cater for MIA Affiliate Members as well.

 

Nonetheless, my view is that if the MIA lists Affiliate Members on its website, that is a promise by the MIA to the public that it endorses the Affiliate Members and will do something about it if one of them lets a lay-client down. It is NOT open to the MIA to try to wash their hands of the matter. At the moment it is also not clear whether the lady in Scotland and/or the Scottish Agency has/have Professional Indemnity insurance.

 

It is a great shame that this has happened because the vast majority of MIA Affiliate Members are responsible, reputable and competent. The only reason why they cannot become Registered Migration Agents is because under the Migration Agents Act only an Australian Citizen or Permanent Resident can become a Registered Migration Agent. The Affiliates should not be shunned simply because they do not have the necessary citizenship/visa status in Australia in my view.

 

However, if the MIA's powers to regulate Affiliate Members turn out to be insuffient or possibly even non-existent then I think it potentially opens separate issues that the MIA needs to address urgently.

 

I understand from George that the MARA has appointed a specific officer to deal with this matter.

 

In conclusion, my own view is that if you are sure you have been let down then contact the TSO for Edinburgh in the first instance before doing anything about starting proceedings.

 

If you are not sure, or you need help to sort out a visa-problem, then I would suggest a word with Alan or George on the phone or by e-mail to begin with because there may be nothing to worry about. From their own experience of other people's timelines etc, one of them would be able to give you an accurate steer about whether it would be helpful to send Form 956 to DIAC asking for DIAC to contact you direct.

 

Best wishes

 

Gill

[Guest deanrm]

Hi All

 

If you have been affected, as Gill says please don't worry. Just contact Alan and/or George and I am sure all will be well in the end.

 

I would hate to think anyone has to go through what we did - so act quickly but as said don't wory too much.

 

Thanks Gill

 

Trisha x x

[Guest The Pom Queen]

Trisha

Sorry to hear you had a bad time, glad you are getting things sorted now. Good Luck!!

[Guest andrew_obrien]

we are using visa connection and they have told me that all thius has come about because of there mara agent leaving them to set up there own company i have been told that Clare will be back in the first week in september. They have just given me my acs number 314687 which doe not seem to work which makes me nervous we started with them in january of this year and have been happy untill now.

 

Please could someone give me some advice

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Hello Andrew

 

Please see the following links:

 

"**** **********" based in Edinburgh featured badly in Daily Record - Poms In Adelaide

 

(I know you have already found the above thread but someone else reading this reply might not have done so.)

 

Visa Connection agency in the Sunday Papers : British Expat Discussion Forum

 

There was an earlier thread about this matter on British Expats but eventually it was deleted. It said that the effort of keeping all the affected clients in touch with each other would be dealt with via Facebook. I haven't a clue about Facebook so I wouldn't begin to know how to search for anything in it.

 

Other people seem to think that Clare has been back in the UK for some weeks now, Andrew?

 

Ozrocks seems to have his finger on the pulse? It might be worth a PM to him via British Expats?

 

Also, I have been told that quite a few VC clients have consulted Richard Gregan of Overseas Emigration in Edinburgh. I am told that he has obtained their files, checked with the skills assessment people, checked with DIAC and is generally ensuring that anything that needs doing is done pronto and where nothing needs doing, Richard now has the files for some of the people who have contacted him and is ensuring that all will be plain sailing for the applicants from now on.

 

However, deciding whether to ask Richard Gregan, George Lombard or Alan Collett for help can only be decided by the client. The three Agents set up a "lifeboat" to help anyone who might need it, but it depends on the person concerned choosing to involve one of them.

 

Richard Gregan

 

Richard's office is literally just around the corner from Clare's office, I gather, so he can arrange for files to be collected if that is what the client instructs Richard to do.

 

Best wishes

 

Gill

[Guest andrew_obrien]

thanks for the advice i have been in contact with greg and alan and awaiting there reply thank you for the advice lets hope i can get things moving again.

[Guest yvonne and paul]

Hi its sooooooooooo stressful all this process without having added problems with agents.

Some of you may have seen a thread a few months ago we placed about the hassel we have had with two agents. the first one never done any thing for us wasting three months!

The second charged us £38000 to do my skills assessment and got it wrong!

So we took action and after some talk with the agent we have had a refund of £2000 back, still payed over the odds for the skills but feel better they admitted they faild us and refunded some money back.

 

On a good note our third and current agent is Go Matilda and have been excellent, very fast and friendly, just wish we had heared of them last year we may have been in Oz by now.

Good luck everyone. Yvonne:jiggy:

[Guest Pinhead]

£38K are you sure?! I hope that was a typo and should have been £3,800.

[Guest yvonne and paul]

£38K are you sure?! I hope that was a typo and should have been £3,800.

 

 

OMG yer it was soz,

 

 

:biglaugh:

[Guest Laura G]

Can't say that I would recommend Richard from OE Visa's

 

Lost 700.00 pound with his agency a couple of years ago!!!!

 

Thought they were not up to scratch!!!!

 

My OH TRA should have been straight forward, he had an apprenticeship with local council in London, references etc. I wasted 9 months with this company who did nothing. Nobody ever rang me back and whoever I spoke to was new and could not answer my questions.

Eventually spoke to Richard who informed me he was an ex Policeman and new more about Scottish law than I did. I had no chance of pursuing a refund!!!!

 

TRA eventually done by someone else, with positive result using the same information that was given to OE Visa's.

 

They wasted my time and money!!

 

Laura

[Guest Tam-and-Andi]

Hi,

We are using the company mentioned in this thread.

We have had a few ups and downs with them, but feel things are running a bit more smoothly with them now.

When I was informed of the news in the daily record news paper I was horrified, so I contacted them with my concerns.

Not sure if allowed to mention names, but the main lady was back from OZ at this time and talked things through with her, and she did leave me feeling confident with her still being our agents.

She is at present working hard at trying to get our Vetassess stuff sorted out.

I do know there are others on here that are using them and have also had problems, but for now I think and hope we are ok.

Thanks for the info though, gets worrying and confusing though.

Andi.

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Can't say that I would recommend Richard from OE Visa's

 

Lost 700.00 pound with his agency a couple of years ago!!!!

 

Thought they were not up to scratch!!!!

 

My OH TRA should have been straight forward, he had an apprenticeship with local council in London, references etc. I wasted 9 months with this company who did nothing. Nobody ever rang me back and whoever I spoke to was new and could not answer my questions.

Eventually spoke to Richard who informed me he was an ex Policeman and new more about Scottish law than I did. I had no chance of pursuing a refund!!!!

 

TRA eventually done by someone else, with positive result using the same information that was given to OE Visa's.

 

They wasted my time and money!!

 

Laura

 

Hi Laura

 

Did you complain to the MARA at the relevant time?

 

Best wishes

 

Gill

[Guest Laura G]

Hi Gill,

 

No I didnt!!

 

Was new to migration at the time and this was in 2003/4

 

I felt at the time intimidated by the phone calls that went on between the 2 of us. Having now worked in the industry and knowing what I now know, I wish I would have.

 

At the time I just felt enough is enough (lots of frustration), Lodged the TRA, which was successful using the information we had and then went on to instruct a new migration agent.

 

I just put it down to a life experience.

 

Also didn't know about PIO if it was around then to find out useful information.

 

I'm so glad there are forums like this where people can try to avoid making mistakes that others have.

 

I would also like to add that my expereince with Richard may not be the same experience that others have received and I acknowledge that.

 

But I cannot tell you how easy our TRA was, especially now that I have experience of dealing with TRA and know what they expect. It was a poor show at the time, but this may have been in-experienced admin staff dealing with my file!!!

 

Laura