Immigration FAQs: Immigration To New Zealand Category

New Zealand Immigration Questions:

Pass marks are falling.

Our work does not end when a visa or a work permit application is made and granted.

We know from experience that all clients will feel insecure and vulnerable while waiting on and indeed after receiving their residence visa or permit approval. To an extent, they are stepping into the unknown. We keep in regular contact with them from the time of our first meeting until after they are well settled in New Zealand.

We co-ordinate client’s essential needs before and after arrival and then provide personal advisory support during those first few tentative weeks and months in the country.

We do more than just process your visa or permit application. We offer a range of services which are aimed at increasing your knowledge of your new home and providing you with a sound background of the country.

In regard to the preparation of your documentation, after you have received our formal instructions, the process normally takes between 4 and 10 weeks for you to gather the documents we require and 3 - 9 months for us to  process your residence case from the time it is lodged. There can be a time delay between when you have gathered the documents we require and when the case is filed if as is common you require a job offer. Why? Because we would normally encourage clients we deem to be highly employable to gather their residence papers before they travel to New Zealand to find work. Why do we do that? Because it sends some serious signals to potential employers about how serious you are in settling here and allows us to obtain work permits more quickly than would usually be the case otherwise. 

Processing times are often dependent on where the case is lodged, which officer is processing it, what the category of entry is and whether or not any problems arise.

Once the application is approved you will be generally be granted around 12 months from that date to enter New Zealand although the typical migrant coming in under the Skilled Migrant Category may well already have a job and be in New Zealand when they are ready to apply for residence.

Most of our clients therefore retain our services for between one and two years. The first year is to get the paperwork correct and the visas issued and some of the second year is spent assisting clients with the settlement process.

A word of warning. Immigration Consultants (the good ones) recognise they are being retained by clients to ensure the outcome is what the client seeks. No one can absolutely guarantee anything in terms of processing times nor outcomes however but the better and more experienced operators who keep abreast of trends in migrant numbers, Government policy shifts and all the factors that can influence processing times are the best placed to provide their clients with the greatest degree of certainty in terms of the big "how long will it take question". None of us want the process to take a day longer than it needs to because of the emotional investment clients have made (and the fact that we are not piad by the hour). But the process is itself difficult to fathom and "straight forward" cases can take an eternity and the tough ones can sail through with an ease not predicted. Such is the nature of dealing with bureaucrats. What we at IMMagine Immigration can do very well is to ensure that you get what you are after. Usually more quickly and with less stress than if you were trying to engage the process on your own.

We receive literally hundreds of emails every month from prospective migrants who need a job in order to get into New Zealand asking us whether we can help them to get the job or how they should go about doing it. Naturally it is the biggest concern for anyone moving from one country to another not only because it tends to be a pre-requisite for entry these days but to put food on the table.

The fact is that many of you are going to require that offer of employment in order to make living in New Zealand a reality. We receive hundreds of letters and electronic messages from people telling us that they have sent off many curriculum vitae to New Zealand companies, schools or other potential employers and have not yet been offered any job. They seem surprised. We are not.

On the one hand New Zealand does have a chronic shortage of skilled workers with record low unemployment (one of the lowest in the developed world at 4.4%).

However, New Zealand employers, like those in your own country we are sure, are reluctant to employ people that they have not met face to face and had a chance to talk to, and who do not have residency in New Zealand and possibly never will, and who understandably are reluctant to "burn their bridges" at home and come over to New Zealand to take up a job (if one was offered) without any guarantee of residence.

So clearly there are major difficulties lying ahead of you. How do you get around the problem? Is it possible to find work without visiting New Zealand?

The short answer in 95% of cases is no.

The first thing which you should do before even contemplating seeking employment in New Zealand is to find out from a professional immigration consultant/adviser what your options are with regard to meeting Government entry criteria, whether that be temporary or permanent and what issues you might confront.

We are constantly amazed how many people find jobs in New Zealand expecting to be able to stay permanently only to be told that their chances are virtually non existent because they do not meet permanent entry criteria. Often this has occurred after they have shipped goods to New Zealand, uprooted their spouses and children and naturally it comes as a great shock some months after they get here. So before you do anything else, download our questionnaire, e-mail it to us along with your payment for our consultation assessment fee and we will then advise you whether we can get you to the starting gates!

If after we have assessed your options we believe residency is a genuine possibility and you require an offer of employment our advice to you will be quite simple - buy an airline ticket and book a trip to New Zealand, which will last at least 4 - 8 weeks  (the longer the better) to find a job. You really have no other choice even if this means applying for visitor visas for those that cannot enter visa free such as those from the UK, US, South Africa and the E.U. If you require a Visitor Visa to travel here to look for work you are in a very delicate situation in relation to how you explain the reasons for your visit here and still be regarded as a genuine visitor/tourist.

Might it be possible to line up interviews before you land in New Zealand?

Possibly, but again it is less likely than if you are here. If you have some specialised skill and a patient employer-to-be in New Zealand then this does happen especially in occupations where there is a desperate shortage. You should really only begin this process a few weeks before you get here or you will be of little interest to employers and recruitment agencies.

It is unlikely a recruitment company will market you in this way before you are here to actually attend any interviews they might be able to line up.

So generally our advice is to start this process of job hunting only when you are here and able to take up the job within a short time.

Who is the best person to market my skills?

Therefore we advise the best way of finding a job is as follows:

1. The internet - increasingly this is the medium by which employers and employees find one another. The largest internet based recruitment site in NZ is www.seek.co.nz but there are plenty of others. - google search for jobs in your field.  You need to aprpeciate up front how almost all vacancies listed however will demand of you a work visa or residence visa before they wish to interview you. A classic catch-22 for most of you. You may wish to discuss solutions to this with us.
2. Use local newspapers and the Situations Vacant columns although this is diminishing in importance, and
3. Identify companies which may be able to use your skills and approach them directly. The local Yellow Pages telephone directory is very helpful in this regard. The yellow pages is on the internet (http://www.yellowpages.co.nz).
4. If you are a full fee paying client of ours you will have access to our private client forum. This is designed to give you access to our network of many thousands of clients - almost all of whom will be working with employers who have no difficulty working with migrants or who have had a positive experience (thanks to Immagine New Zealand Immigration) in negotiating the immigation bureacracy.

Try Personnel recruitment companies but don't be disappointed if they don't appear overjoyed to see or hear from you.