Australian Immigration Daily News

Let’s say a Spanish passport holder wants to travel to Australia on an Electronic Travel Authority e601. This traveller thinks he will find accurate information in the Home Affairs website but when he tries to lodge an online application, he will soon discover that his passport is not one of the eight eligible to apply online. The ETA e601 is available for thirty-three nationalities, however, an online application is only possible for eight of them. Then, what is the avenue to do a valid application for the other twenty-five nationalities?

Item 1208A(1) submits that an application must be made in a way set out in regulation 2.07AB. Then, Reg. 2.07AB(3) states if a person makes an application for an ETA to a diplomatic or consular office, or an office of an agent approved in writing by the Minister, by telephone, in writing, by electronic transmission, the person is taken to have made the application at that office.

In this direction, item 1208A(3)(d) affirms that an application made in Australia must be made at a diplomatic, consular office, or an office of an agent approved in writing by the Minister.

If both instruments accept that an application can be made to a Diplomatic or consular office, why the Department of Home Affairs do not mention that alternative? Instead, a very vague suggestion is included in their website: “Contact your agent or service provider to find out whether they provide this service”. So, what happens if our agent or service provider do not provide that service? What remedy is proposed by the Department? None.

The instrument referred by 2.07AB(3) and item 1208A(3)(d) is IMMI 13/009. This enumerates as agents approved by the Minister, all air carriers able to access ETAS, all travel agencies registered by IATA, Australia Visa Services at the Australian Commerce and Industry Office, Taipei, subscribers to computer reservation systems in Schedule A (i.e. Amadeus, Sabre) and the agents listed in Schedule B who has access to ETAS. The agents referred in the Schedule B are five.

On a personal attempt and following the department’s advice, I called three of the biggest, most commercial and renowned travel agencies in Australia to find out if they provided this ETA application service. None of them provide it. Also, I emailed the five agents listed in Schedule B of IMMI 13/009. Only one of them replied back saying they had no idea to what ETA I was talking about. Finally, I decided to contact the biggest Australian airline to ask about this ETA application. They referred me to a really big private visa processing centre with many locations around the world and responsible for processing applications of several countries. I thought why I had to find out about this processing centre through an enquiry to an airline? Why the Department was not transparent to include it in their website or policy? Instead, a brief statement to contact your agent to find out whether they provide that service, was far away to be the answer. Moreover, IMMI 13/009 does not include this processing centre as one of the approved agents.

With this information, our Spanish passport holder applicant contacted this private processing centre to have his ETA lodged. After few days of waiting time, the decision from the Department finally came: He had to do the application in an Australian diplomatic mission. In other words, the same Department who suggests to contact an agent or service provider to do this application, decides in the outcome of the application, that it has to be done in a Diplomatic mission.

PAM clearly says that “Policy intends that holders of  eVisitor eligible passports … apply for the TV-651 eVisitor visa ...” But why if an ETA eligible passport holder can apply for an ETA should apply for a 651 instead? PAM does not include any reason to explain it.

As a conclusion, if your applicant is a passport holder of one of the twenty-five nationalities not allowed to lodge online, do not rush to do a 651 and neither to “Contact your agent or service provider to find out whether they provide this service”, instead save time for your client and find the relevant Australian diplomatic mission to process an ETA e601 application.

Miguel Valderrama can be contacted on: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.