[brian]

Only real option i have is to do a new skills assessment with all of my experience and self employed history.

I will have to pay the 900 odd dollar fee again. Since I have already had priority processing for the first time I doubt I can get it again, so likely only 900, and then I wait the few months for my assessment outcome.

Then resubmit an EOI.

I think its an absolute joke they didnt consider it but there’s nothing i can do. Just pay the fees again.

[brian]

I emailed them direct to ask for clarification and received a formal response.

They only recognised my experience post deemed skilled date, and only if it was assessed by vetassess. They did not include any of the self employed history that I included (which all fell after my “deemed skilled date”)

Only experience assessed positively by vetassess was taken into account. Nothing else. Not even the 2 months I continued to work but did not submit to vetassess. So to explain I submitted up until april for one position, and then continued to work there another 2 months after the vetassess application. Those 2 months, in the same position, were not counted by NSW as they were not sent off to vetassess when I did my skills assessment application.

Seems really unfair.

If they had counted everything I submitted, I would have had over 3 years post skilled date. Instead I fell short just under 3months.

[brian]

Ya I think im too old to study now too. From what I hear they are extremely strict on mature age students

Not to mention the international student fees are insanely high.

[brian]

Ya. But the chances of a new invitation to apply for nomination are next to zero.

Go through all the expense, effort, waiting for a new skills assessment and my chance of getting an invitation are slim to none. That was the chance. In another 2 years my age points drop. Not to mention my work experience expires as they only consider 10 years of experience.

They make it impossible for people to immigrate legally officially and no wonder people go in illegally.

[brian]

I guess I can only resubmit a new eoi.

Might submit to vetassess again with self employment history and hope they deem me to have full 3.3years and then pray I get a new invite.

What a joke.

[brian]

Thank you for your recent application for NSW nomination for the Skilled Nominated visa (subclass 491). After careful consideration, we regret to inform you that we are unable to approve your application at this time.

Reason for Refusal

The reason we refused your application is that you were unable to demonstrate 3 years offshore skilled employment which is a requirement.

Next steps
if you wish to be considered for NSW nomination again in the future, you must submit a new and correct EOI in SkillSelect. Noting that any future invitations are not guaranteed.

=======

I am completely at a loss right now.

I have over 5 years of experience.

Vetassess assessed me with 2.88 years post date deemed skilled- employment

I provided significant further evidence for self employment of another 6month period.

Total experience in the position was 5 years and about 3months.

Vetassess post date deemed skilled experience – 2.88 years.

• This reply was modified 1 month, 2 weeks ago by  brian.
• This reply was modified 1 month, 2 weeks ago by  brian.

[brian]

Hi Mark,

As yet I still have not received any communication or messages and no full nomination. Starting to lose hope a bit here.. should I try to contact them or do I just keep waiting?

They asked about my current employment on 1 July which I responded the same day. And then my email to them was on 8th july where I proactively sent extra docs for my self employed history. I received the automated reply from the mailbox.

Thanks

[brian]

Thanks so much for the reply. Very helpful and reassuring. Will hopefully all work out and get a response soon. 👍

[brian]

Hi,

Quick update.

Almost 8 weeks since receiving invitation to apply for nomination to NSW 491.

Just over 6 weeks since applying for full nomination.

2 weeks since receiving a request for more information – current employment status and update. I received the email asking about current employment – I am not currently employed in my chosen occupation. I responded to the email directly and did not amend anything in the EOI because I am currently unemployed and searching for new work. I did not receive any response except the automated email reply from the mailbox.

8 days since I PROACTIVELY sent further documents and complete evidence for self employed period. (50 odd pages as a single pdf of evidence including invoices, bank statements, sample data, emails, company docs etc), this COMPLETE evidence was not previously uploaded into the NSW application portal because the portal is a bit chunky, not user friendly and perhaps I just made a mistake not submitting it all at first because it was a 10mb file and I should have found a way to do so. Either way I felt I should just proactively send it before they possibly request further information about it.

I have only received the automated response on both of the emails I sent.

I have not updated my original EOI which I submitted some 3 months ago. It still shows:

– Relevant employment in the last 10 years. A total of 4 years and 8 months of employment. (This includes the experience before the confusing vetassess ‘deemed skilled date’.)

Points automatically calculated in EOI from my experience was 5 points for 3years of experience.

I gathered extra evidence to support my application – this was self employment evidence. Some 50 pages of emails, invoices, bank statements, letters, sample data etc). This was included after the original submission because I was still gathering data at the time of EOI submission. And purely to ensure if they deduct 2 years of skilled experience (prior to ‘deemed skilled date’), I can prove my self employed period and still achieve over 3 years of skilled, post ‘deemed skilled’ work experience to claim 5 points.

I’m worried about changing my EOI or doing anything further that could jeopardise my application.

Up to now and with my application I have submitted and provided evidence of employment for full history of employment in the occupation. Total of 5 years and 2 months. (Vetasses deemed me skilled after 2 years and deducted those years. ) I am only claiming 3 years of skilled employment but provided all 5 years and 2 months of experience.

Included a statement with my application to state I included my self employed period of employment to add a full history of my employment, not to add or claim further points, because I was unsure if my experience prior to the deemed skilled date by vetassess would be counted or if it would be deducted

Is there anything more i can do? If i should change my EOI should I do it? – remove 2 years of relevant (prior deemed skilled experience), and then add my self employed period?

I check my emails everyday and wake up early anxiously awaiting full invitation so I can submit the visa application next. This is exhausting and I am about to go somewhat off the grid in Africa for about 6 weeks.

[brian]

Hi Mark.

I finally received a request for more information. They have asked if I am currently employed in my field or closely related field.

I am not. I am looking for a new job to gain further experience but I was almost certain I do not need to be employed in that field to qualify for nomination.

Do I just reply via email? Something like:

Thank you for your email.

I would like to confirm that I am not currently employed in my nominated occupation of Aerial Survey Technician.

I understand that employment in the nominated occupation is not a mandatory requirement under the pathway I am applying through.

Please let me know if any further information is required.

———-

From what i can see on the nsw.gov website under 491 it does not state any requirement to be employed in my occupation under pathway 2.

Be invited to apply by Investment NSW

To be considered for NSW nomination under Pathway 2 you must:

• Be skilled in an occupation that is:

  • within an ANZSCO unit group identified on the NSW Regional Skills List; and

  • is eligible for this visa.

• Be currently residing:

  • in NSW and have continuously resided in NSW for a minimum period of three months; or

  • offshore and have continuously resided offshore for a minimum period of three months.

[brian]

Hey Mark. I submitted my application for the full nomination almost 4 weeks ago now. I know the NSW processing guidelines is about 6weeks but feeling a bit stressed it’s taking so long as I’ve seen numerous posts on FB and other forums where people applied around the same time and have since received full nomination.

Is the end of the financial year likely to influence times?

Also, I have a big camping trip booked in already for end of July through august. South africa, Namibia and botswana.

I’ve read that I will likely need a medical and police clearance for the application and apparently i can do the medical in other countries, only I need to see an approved doctor and have my HAP ID linked with my application in order to schedule the medical, which will then link to my application.

I could do my police clearance now early, but not the medical.

Should I do this?

If they exceed the 6 weeks and I dont receive full invitation before I leave for the trip, if they ask for more information but im innthe bush with no signal or wifi how much time do.they usually give me to respond to their request for info? Obviously dont want to miss any requests or deadlines.

Thanks

[brian]

I should clarify i definitely submitted more docs here than i submitted to vetasses. But in terms of all the docs I had gathered and then the limitations with the system, and how they wanted it structured or uploaded it wasn’t what I had prepared and had to go through everything and rearrange docs.

I walked away feeling like I could have easily uploaded another huge amount of evidence.

[brian]

Hi Mark,

So I gathered a lot of evidence and was ready to submit.

First, I contacted an old agent I had consulted and been assessed with last year. I wanted to ask her questions about the deemed skill date and how they deduct years. I found some videos online that seem to point to people being misled by the deemed skilled date but I couldn’t find a clear answer anywhere – hence reached out to the agent.

I couldn’t believe the response I got, it was shocking to be honest. A typical consultation or assessment is about 30 to 45mins long and costs about 250 to 300 aussie dollars.

Well this agent got back and immediately congratulated me on the invitation to apply. Then proceeded to quote me 1700 aussie dollars to look at my documetns and submit. they were not open to a consultation where I could just ask a question for 300 dollars.

Needless to say I didn’t take them up. seemed like daylight robbery. I hope I don’t regret that but I feel I gathered a lot of evidence.

The uploading system was easy. But there were a few things I had to just grab on the fly that I had not prepared.

1. Last six months of bank statements for my current account. Not impossible but a bit stressful – they wanted to see everyday transactions. Well, I use a credit card for everyday things and earn travel points and bonuses – but I read online that credit cards are not your own bank account. Anyway, I gathered my bank account statements and combined them. It showed payments to my other account and credit cards but not much shopping and subscriptions (I don’t really have any to be honest).

2. Driving license – this is apparently to verify my identity. So I quickly scanned that in.
3. Passport.
4. Vetassess skills assessment outcome letter.

5. English language exam results

6. Any education degrees or certificates.
7. Work experience and points claims.
– Fill out your points scores. Choosing years of experience claimed and age and so on.

Upload documents.
Now I had pains takingly arranged them into periods of work at different companies. The upload system seemed to split the uploads into options.
Payslips,
Bank statements showing salary payments,
Employer references,
Tax documents,
Superannuation docs.
Employment contracts.

Some of the documents I did not actually have. I had Employer references, bank statements and salary payments, payslips.

So I uploaded what I had. But I had file size limitations so felt I had to only include 2 or 3 payslips for each job. A handful of bank statements for each year I am claiming. Employment contracts – I only had one, also included a statutory declaration for my self employment year with client references. But couldn’t include all sample data and extras (they actually warn again including extra documents).

I feel like I submitted more documents to vetassess but couldn’t fit them all on here.

I don’t know if I need to contact them and offer more documents. Or if I will be contacted if they need any further information from me.

It was very stressful.

And then the payment – I had 30mins to pay before the link expired. Fair enough – but if the link expired it delays your processing even more.

Here’s hoping I didn’t drop the ball when I didn’t take up that agents 1700 dollar offer to do my application.

• This reply was modified 4 months, 1 week ago by  brian.

[brian]

to prove self employed experience I have gathered a bunch of evidence so far and have reached out to previous contacts at companies I did projects for, they have agreed to give me client testimonials for my work and projects and attest that I was working for myself and info about their role and such. Do you happen to have any recommendations on how to structure a client testimonial letter?

I have also found:

– company registration certs

– tax registration certificate for the company. Including the receipts from the accountants who consulted and got my docs.

– a few project reports and the outputs/data files.

– some correspondence emails between clients and myself (the original email address is shutdown but I had setup a backup Google at some point which received automatic backups).

– invoices for a few projects as well as one or two actual purchase orders

– proposal documents where I worked on city tender proposals and other project proposals.

– website and domain name registration emails and receipts for domain name hosting for.my company website.

– my own self declaration that I was working for myself and doing various projects. (Any recommendations or template to structure this?)

– I can also get supplier testimonials from other 3rd party contractors i used to assist on some projects. I have reached out to them

– I have company documents, brochures with service offerings, business card designs and website imagery etc.

– I have 2 email and documents from the bank where I setup the company accounts. However I do not have access and I do not have bank statements as the account long since closed down.

I’m looking for more info and trying to track down other stuff but for now that’s what I have.

In my own declaration, still working out the format and structure, I plan to explain that the economy and political instability in the country and the region lead me to only work for myself for only those 6months, and when I realised it wasn’t feasible and stable enough that’s when I took the next job overseas.

[brian]

Hi Mark.

Wow! I got an invitation to apply, today from NSW. I cannot believe it!!