Visitor Visa applications for the Christmas and New Year period. Lodge your application now to avoid disappointment.

Added by John Bell on October 1, 2014
Saved under Articles by Migration Agents

Visitor Visa applications for the Christmas and New Year period. Lodge your application now to avoid disappointment.

If you are intending to visit Australia for the December/January holiday period the Department of Immigration experiences a very high volume of visa applications during this period, which causes delays in visa processing. In order to avoid disappointment, we recommend that you follow these guidelines when lodging your visitor visa application:

1) Lodge your visa application well in advance of your date of travel (at least 2 months). The average processing time for visitor visa applications during this period may be up to 1 month.

The Department of Immigration global processing standard for visitor visas is 1 month and it generally takes at least 2 weeks to prepare a visitor visa application prior to lodgement. We therefore recommend that you lodge your visa application well in advance of your proposed date of travel (we recommend at least 2 months prior to your intended date of travel to give you a buffer).

The Department of Immigration strives to ensure that all visa applications are finalised prior to the date of travel, but they do not guarantee it will be processed by your requested travel date. This is made much easier to facilitate where visa applicants lodge their application well in advance. To start the visitor visa application process start here.

2) Ensure that your visitor visa application is lodged complete, with all required supporting documentation.

If your visa application is lodged without all required supporting documentation, it is likely that your visa application will be either refused or significantly delayed. National Visas Registered Migration Agents ensure that you provide all required documents at the time of lodgement to reduce any possible processing delays.

3) A medical examination in order to be granted a visitor visa may be required.

Medical examinations may be required prior to lodging the visa application. Wherever possible arrange to do this before you lodge your visa application, otherwise your visa application may be subject to significant delays.

There are two common examples where visitor visa applicants may be required to do a medical examination and/or chest xray with a departmental panel doctor:

Over 75 year olds: you will need to undertake a medical examination.
In some cases if you are requesting a stay period for longer than 3 months: you will need to undertake a chest xray.

Your National Visas Registered Migration Agent will review your case in detail and advise you if any medical examinations are required. Please note it generally takes at least a week (allow 2 weeks) to organise a medical and then have the results recorded by the Department of Immigration.

4) Processing.

National Visas is always happy to assist you to ensure your visa application is processed in time for your intended date during this period. We also ask that you contact us via email using the Online Message Centre, rather than via telephone to ensure quick responses to your questions.

The Department of Immigration work hard to ensure that they finalise all visa applications prior to the intended date of travel, but please remember they do not guarantee it will be processed by your requested travel date so it is critical to lodge your application sooner rather later to avoid disappointment.

If you have compassionate and compelling reasons for your trip to Australia and you need to travel urgently, National Visas can request the application is processed quickly and The Department of Immigration will try to accommodate the request wherever possible.

To start the visitor visa application process using National Visas services please start here.

Regards,

John Bell
Migration Advisor
MARN: 0321386

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John Bell

Migration Advisor at National Visas

John Bell has been involved in the immigration industry since 2000 and has practiced in Australia as an Australian Registered Migration Agent since 2003. John also worked in the UK as a UK immigration adviser between 2000 and 2002.