Australians citizens that want marry someone who is not an Australian resident, may have to save a big amount of money to get their partners here.
Partnership visa fees hav
e increased almost 400 per cent in the last five years, currently sitting at $6,865 – one of the highest in the world. There are other costs as well, for health checks ($300), police checks ($50-150) and potential migration agent or lawyers’ fees ($3,000-5,000). If a couple has children, each one will cost another $2,370.
On top of the cost, couples face long processing times of over a year, due to the strong demand for partner visas making processing times exceed the service standard in some cases.
The Australian Productivity Commission punctuate that the high visa charges could risk Australians leaving the country altogether in order to be with their overseas partners, however, the Immigration Minister office justified the cost by pointing to social services such as HECS and Medicare that partners become eligible for.
The increase in prices has meant that more people are preparing applications without a representative or lawyer, leading to increased rejections. Official figures show that approximately 80% of applications are successful, with thousands refused or withdrawn each year and if the application fails, the department doesn’t provide a refund.
According to SBS diagram, The UK charges less than half that for an equivalent visa – $2,428 AUD – and the US charges less than a third – $1,477 AUD.
Are you interested in partnership visa or finding the ways to bring your partner to Australia? Would you like to know more? Well, just contact us, we are happy to assist in your process.
