Scammers are preying on visa hopefuls from the Indian subcontinent and China with the promise of visas, ready jobs with high salaries and short work hours in the fruit-picking and livestock industries.

DIBP has issued a statement that, “[DIBP has] become aware of a fraudulent website work4australia.com that claims to provide genuine migration services to Australia.

“The scam is an offer of a five-year eVisa with a USD4700 fee. It directs individuals to travel to Thailand, where a representative from the supposed organisation receives the payment and provides travel documents to Australia," notes the DIBP statement.

The website was registered sometime in April this year with the registrant listed as Alexndar Kriss according to the domain checking service whois.com. I tried calling the number but there was only an automated answering service response requiring my details be left behind for a callback.

More tell-tale signs of the scam were street address listed as follows: “Stree-11 / Town Point 90 Sippy Downs Dr, Sippy Downs QLD 4556, Queens Land Australia “

The website provides seven images of people representing various nationalities all of whom except the registrant are without surnames. None are registered migration agents. (http://work4australia.com/contact.php)

Join us for

Exclusive SIV cocktail event

Following the successful SIV cocktail events held in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne,  Migration Alliance is delighted to invite migration agents who practice in, or have an interest in Significant Investor 188 and 888 applications to an exclusive event by our sponsors NAB Private Wealth to be now held in Perth.

Interview by: Tanaya Das
Photo inset: Eddy Kang running to avoid ABC cameras after a CTTT hearing.

The Department of Fair Trading is now actively investigating Eddie Kang.

Re: Current issues with health systems

We want you to alert you to the fact that there have been some problems occurring in the electronic immigration health process since our last systems release on 22 August 2014 – these have been preventing some clients/agents being able to access eMedical Client via the ‘Organise your health examinations’ link in ImmiAcccount.

This was impacting clients who had lodged a GVP processed online visa application. However, this has now been resolved. A new issue has, however, been identified which is preventing some clients from accessing eMedical Client after lodging a My Health Declarations form. We will be scheduling a fix for this as soon as possible (hopefully mid next week). However, in the interim, please make sure that if completing an MHD form all address fields are populated when completing the form to avoid your case being impacted by this problem.

What will happen to sponsors training funds contributed under Training Benchmark A, should the DIBP approved training institutions close down?

Currently, most of the Training Benchmark A funds from employers seeking sponsorship under the sc457 program find their way to various TAFE institutes largely due DIBPs encouragement.

The legislative instrument however only provides broad directions as follows: “Recent expenditure, by the business, to the equivalent of at least 2% of the payroll of the business, in payments allocated to an industry training fund that operates in the same industry as the business.”

But DIBPS website, PAMs and FAQs generally encourage funds be directed to TAFEs, with PAMs specifically setting as follows:

“To meet the requirements of Training Benchmark A, the applicant can show evidence of having made a contribution to a recognised scholarship fund that is operated by an Australian university or TAFE college that supports education or training for Australian citizens or permanent residents in a course related to the business of the applicant.”