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Posts in category: Skilled Migrant Category
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Danger in the Pool
Just when you thought it was safe to get back into the water after the Skilled Migrant changes earlier this year in both New Zealand and Australia, it seems that you might need to think again.
Both countries allow applicants to file Expressions of Interest and enter their skilled migrant pools – in Australia you need a minimum of 60 points and in New Zealand, 160, (we give more points to qualifications and work experience but the type of person with those scores will be very similar). In both countries the immigration year begins on 1 July.
New Zealand targets 27,000 skilled migrants per year with a variance of 10%. Between the start of the immigration year and 3 November, New Zealand approved and issued around 4,100 resident visas. If you annualise that you’ll see that it will barely reach 50% of the stated target. That is not to tell the whole story however. We had clearly signalled that there would be no pool ‘draws’ for six weeks through to late August as the new system was reset. This saw three draws skipped.
It may be that numbers recover in the months to come but given the difficulties I have written about so often about the disconnect between the visa process and the labour market (employers want work visas but Government won’t give work visas without jobs for the most part), the jury is out on whether New Zealand will reach its self-declared quotas this year.
I see no prospect of pass mark increases.
The question is whether we will see it fall. If so when the politicians will let it as unemployment continues to fall rapidly in NZ. It is now down to 4.6% which effectively means if you want to work there is a job with your name on it.
We are continuing to find that in the significant majority of cases our English speaking and experienced clients are finding jobs in 8-10 weeks. If all migrants are doing the same then I think that there is a chance the pass marks may not need to fall and the next few months will confirm that.
Over in Australia things have taken a bizarre turn in recent times.
The Aussies, never ones for originality, took the NZ skilled migrant system – Expressions of Interest (EOI), a pool, selection and invitation, modified it and I believe are seeing the first signs of it falling apart.
Historically to meet their own skilled migrant quotas (which are not national quotas like NZ where you compete against everyone chasing one of those 27,000 places, but occupation quotas – you compete against those in the same ‘nominated occupation’ as you).
Historically, the Australians needed to select 2000 EOIs each selection period. They have cut that in half since July 1. Inexplicably or with an arrogance that one might suggest is misplaced, they feel no obligation it seems to ever explain what they are doing, nor why. The implications of cuts to the numbers being selected means more people are fighting for fewer places and that pushes up pass marks.
One might speculate they might be doing this to push applicants toward state sponsorship. It would be nice to know.
In Australia, each State or territory has its own ‘in demand’ occupation lists so there is the possibility the Federal Government is in effect abandoning their own national occupation targets and devolving the decision on which skilled migrants get into Australia to the various States. If they are it makes some sense. I’ve never understood how some bureaucrat in Canberra can possibly know how many Primary School Teachers, Electrical Engineers or Software Developers the economy needs over the next year.
State sponsorship has the advantage of creating greater certainty for our clients as the pass mark for those with state sponsorship is fixed at 60.
Further, the Australian Government recently decided, again without explanation, not to do a pool draw. This has huge implications on many levels. We have at least one client in the pool (after racing the clock to get him to that point following a Herculean effort by our team in Melbourne) who turns 40 any day now. At that point, while he will still secure a Permanent Resident Visa, it won’t be the ‘live wherever you wish’ visa, but a State Sponsorship visa which requires him to have an ‘intention’ to settle, or at least spend two years in that state. He doesn’t have to live there, the law on that is clear, but he is expected to ‘give it a go’ (whatever that means).
If the Australian Government does not offer greater certainty to applicants they’ll lose people they say they need as more and more choose countries where a plan offers greater certainty.
We also suspect that Australia is suffering a flood of fraudulent or at least mischievous EOIs. Whereas in NZ you pay to file an EOI, in Australia you don’t. I have always thought this invited frivolous applications. When there is no skin in the game there is nothing stopping people filling as many EOIs as they like.
If they claim the pass mark they must be selected. Equally stupidly, unlike NZ, being selected from the pool leads to an automatic and guaranteed Invitation to Apply for residence. We believe that this is the reason that the pass mark for Accountants for example shot up to 85 points despite the annual quota of places being doubled this immigration year. The pass mark at the end of the previous immigration year was 70-75. When you double the supply of places unless there is an unprecedented increase in demand (which there has not been) the pass mark should have fallen, not gone up. That strongly suggests people are filing frivolous applications. And why not? It’s free!
I hope the Aussies learn from NZ some of the lessons of running a pool system. Charge to get into it. Don’t automatically invite everyone that you select. Carry out credibility assessments. Invite them when things look credible. They’d cut down on the fraudulent and plain stupid applications if people had to pay the $500 odd that you pay to file an EOI in NZ and while credibility checks in NZ still result in large numbers of applicants being declined, our system isn’t broken.
Australia’s is. While they don’t tend to take advice off Kiwis they might want to do so on this occasion.
If they don’t, skilled migrants will continue to look elsewhere when Australia’s slowly falling unemployment rates and an improving job market for skills suggests they need these skills sets.
But hey, they’re Aussies, and since when have you been able to tell an Aussie they might not be doing something right?
Until next week...
The Skilled Migrant – Determining Deemed Qualified Date
Under the new Skilled Migrant rules that were formally released this week but which I have had a copy of for some time, applicants now face a somewhat complicated issue when claiming points for work experience under the Skilled Migrant Category.
The Government has now introduced what is effectively a “deemed qualified date”. I suspect many people, including Immigration Officers, are going to have a lot of trouble working out when that date occurred. Under the new rules, anyone trying this application process themselves has to become familiar with the Australia New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (ANZSCO) reference material. This “book” is a list of all the occupations known to these two Government departments and provide task lists for them.
Only work experience that is Skill Level 1, 2 or 3 as recorded in ANZSCO will now qualify for work experience points (with some exceptions but I won’t go there).
You will be required to identify the occupation that most closely matches your claimed period of work experience.
Once you have done that you’ll notice that ANZSCO records that a particular qualification such as a degree or diploma or certificate is required to be deemed qualified or (usually) some period of work experience may substitute for that qualification. More higher-level/skilled work experience tends to require a Bachelor Degree or higher, or five years of work experience can substitute for it.
Where the applicant does not have the listed relevant qualification, they must deduct five years of their Skill Level 1, 2 or 3 work experience from their overall work experience claim.
Where an applicant has both the relevant degree and more than the minimum years of relevant work experience, the rule book is meant to say they get to choose which they want to use to be deemed qualified.
In a situation where an applicant completed school, went to university, obtained a degree for example and then began their career, it’s relatively simple, i.e. you would be deemed qualified and would claim you were based on when you got your degree.
If you have no degree you must deduct a few years of skilled work experience from your claim.
If you fished school, went to work and then say completed a degree when you were older, it becomes far more problematic.
Take for example, a 38 year old who completed a Bachelor of Commerce in 2012 but had been working as a Marketing Manager since they were aged 27.
They have 9 years of work at Skill Level 1, 2 or 3 as a Marketing Manager and let’s also assume they have a job in New Zealand as a Marketing Manager.
They must therefore decide whether they use the Bachelor Degree as the deemed qualified date and only the five years of post-qualification work experience since 2012 or they deduct five years of work experience from the 9 years that they have, leaving 4 years of work experience for which points can be awarded.
This gives two very different outcomes and could be the difference between success or failure. If the applicant went with option 1, their points look like the following:
Age 30
Degree 50
Work experience 50
Job offer 50
Total 180
If they went with the second option, then their points are:
Age 30
Degree 50
Work experience 20
Job offer 40
Total 140
Another complication that has been introduced into the process is that the degree must be deemed “relevant” to the occupation listed in ANZSCO. So what happens if, for example, in the example above, the applicant’s Bachelor of Commerce was in Economics but they have worked as a Marketing Manager? Is that going to be deemed to be relevant by an Immigration Officer or not?
The rule book now suggests that Immigration Officers should look at the “major” in determining the answer. But how much of a degree is a major and how much is a minor? And what happens if, for example, one-third of the subjects were marketing-related, one-third perhaps accounting and one-third economics? How will Immigration Officers determine whether that is relevant or not relevant to working as a Marketing Manager?
One suspects, inconsistently.
What has been delivered to us in terms of the Skilled Migrant Category is a level of complexity we have never seen before. Applicants are going to have to be able to justify against ANZSCO job descriptions why their employment is deemed to be Skill Level 1, 2 or 3 and then to demonstrate by way of evidence that the work periods they have claimed points for are a very close match to it. I will make a very bold but easy prediction right now – rejection rates for those selected from the Pool and decline rates for those who file Resident Visa applications will go through the roof.
Until next week…
Amendments to the Skilled Migrant Instructions
Government released the amendments to the skilled migrant instructions yesterday that I and a few other experts have been helping to draft in recent weeks.
No surprises having seen a third draft ten days ago.
Major changes to Skilled Migrant points include:
- Increase in points for those aged 30-39 from 25 to 30 points
- Increase in points for Master degrees and higher from 60 to 70 points
- Increase in points for work experience from a maximum 30 to 50 points
Reduction or elimination of points for:
- Close family in NZ - was 10, now 0
- Qualifications in an area of absolute skills shortage - was 10 now 0
- NZ work experience - from maximum of 15 down to 10
- Partner’s qualifications - Diploma or less to 0 (from 10) points , Bachelor or higher down to 10 (from 20 points)
Addition of:
- Points for high salary of around $97,000 - 20
One interesting change is that any job in NZ that comes with a guaranteed minimum salary (note, not remuneration package) of $73,299 is deemed to be skilled for points (50 of them if the job is offered in Auckland or 80 if outside) and all relevant, for want of a better word, work experience now attracts points.
The example we like to offer is the migrant with a job in NZ as a pencil salesman and 20 years work experience in the same occupation will now get points for the job offer and all his work experience (even though neither has historically counted) so long as there is a guaranteed salary of a touch under $75,000. This is a radical departure and demonstrates that skill can now be based on what the position pays.
In theory a tea lady who is guaranteed this salary can get into NZ permanently.
At the same time the Government has released new Essential Skills Work Visa rules and again no surprises.
The key points here are:
- Salary prescribes how long the work visa can be granted for (up to 12 months, 3 years or 5 years)
- At the lowest end of the scale low skilled workers can apply to ‘renew’ their work visas for another two blocks of 12 months but must leave NZ at the end of the stay for a full 12 months. They will also not be able to bring their partners or children with them. This is a clear signal Government does not expect these lower skill folk to expect to put down roots or ask to stay long term (it isn’t going to happen)
In a further change that is already causing havoc is Government now expects all employers to demonstrate they have historically, and will in future, comply with all NZ immigration and employment law.
I am not sure how anyone can prove they will not break a law in future...and I do not know how they can prove that they have not in the past without getting a letter from the Ministry of Justice confirming no convictions against that company or business for breaches of such laws.
Instead of perhaps telling employers to do precisely this, in typical INZ fashion they are taking this rule to extremes and case officers are demanding for example tax records for every employee in a company and along with that, wage and hours worked records for every employee.
Only this week this evidence has been demanded from a company a client of ours has been offered a senior management role with, paying six figures...the company employs 41 staff including three migrants. You might think, given the rules are designed to prevent migrants being exploited, INZ would only want to see the records of the three on work visas. But no, they want the lot...
We have questioned senior INZ managers how reviewing tax records and hours worked of a person proves that the employer has not broken any laws? If they had copies of their employment contracts then maybe, but they are not asking for all 41 of those.
These new rules for both Skilled Migrant Category are going to be a nightmare. The great thing about being invited to assist in drafting them is understanding the objective of the changes making us best placed to push back when, inevitably and sadly, immigration officers get it all wrong. The madness seems never to end.
Until next week...
Iain MacLeod - Southern Man
