The Current Situation

The 2020-2021 financial year is drawing to a close, and many applicants both inside and outside Australia are still struggling for their PR. The quotas for the new financial year are not much different from this year’s, and while skilled migration applicants are hoping for improvement in the next financial year, realistically, we cannot expect dramatic changes. The GTI assessment standards have also become increasingly strict, with unused quota to spare.

In fact, I have always believed that if you can find a suitable employer willing to sponsor you, an employer-sponsored visa is a very good option.

For overseas applicants, their relevant work experience typically offers a greater advantage in both duration and professional depth compared to onshore applicants.

For onshore applicants, given the surge in subclass 189 points in recent years, and the fact that work experience/relevant work experience has become a hard requirement for most state-sponsored applications, their strength in employment is not to be underestimated either.

It is time to move beyond the fixed mindset that work experience can only give you extra points or meet one of the application criteria.

Suitable? Or Not Suitable?

What type of applicant is best suited to an employer-sponsored visa?

1. Applicants who find it difficult to accumulate high points for skilled migration;

2. Applicants with 1-2 years of full-time work experience;

3. Applicants whose nominated occupation has a qualifying employer willing to provide sponsorship;

4. Students who cannot achieve 7s or 8s across the board in their English test;

5. Those wanting to neatly bypass the skills assessment.

If you meet criteria 1-5 above, then congratulations — you are likely a very strong fit for an Australian employer-sponsored visa.

In the course of providing migration consultations, I have found that many students hold prejudices and fears about employer sponsorship because they do not fully understand this category of visa, which leads to apprehension and hesitation. Our professional team, led by more than ten registered migration agents, has handled all kinds of cases along the way, and once you have handled enough of them, you come to realise that employer sponsorship is not like skilled migration or state sponsorship visas, where there is a points table and meeting the criteria guarantees PR. This is the honest truth from accumulated experience, not an evasive platitude.

Employer-sponsored visas involve both the employer’s conditions and the applicant’s own circumstances, making it very hard to give a standard answer — every case needs to be tailored individually.

That said, also from experience, let me share with you some insights on the top 5 soul-searching questions I am routinely asked about employer sponsorship:

Every Time Someone Consults Me on Employer Sponsorship

The Top 5 “Soul-Searching” Questions I Am Asked!

1. What is the most important condition for the applicant?

First, the employer-sponsored visas we are referring to are mainly the subclass 482 and 186 visas; the subclass 407 visa also requires employer sponsorship, so I will include it here as well.

Generally, the prerequisite for applying for a subclass 482 visa is at least 2 years of full-time work experience. Fortunately, for the vast majority of occupations, applying for a subclass 482 visa does not require a skills assessment — you only need to meet the 2-year full-time work experience prerequisite (work experience that can be evidenced; cash-in-hand work does not count), and have a nominated occupation on the Department of Home Affairs’ list, to be considered for a subclass 482 employer-sponsored work visa.

If the applicant’s nominated occupation is on the Medium and Long-term Strategic Skills List, then after meeting the subclass 186 application requirements, they can apply for subclass 186 permanent residency.

2. I don’t know whether my employer can sponsor me?

Every client who consults me about an employer-sponsored visa asks me this question. Here, I would like to address it for everyone in one go.

First, employer sponsorship requirements differ depending on the nominated occupation. The specifics depend on the occupation in question, and in Question 3 I will list a few of the occupations people most frequently ask about, along with the additional requirements they impose on employers.

Second, applicants need to carry out a preliminary self-assessment first, looking at:

• How long has the company been established?
• Does the employer’s scope of business cover the nominated occupation?
• How many employees are currently on staff?
• What is the financial position? What is the turnover? Is the business in profit?
• Are there any employees currently being sponsored?

Once the applicant has a clear picture of the above, we can then take the assessment a step further into the details.

To assess whether a business currently has the standing to act as a sponsoring employer, the main thing we need is for the company’s financial statements and organisational chart to be sent to us so we can conduct a proper assessment. It is irresponsible to the applicant to say “OK” or “not OK” in just a few words.

In summary, there is really no way to give a single unified standard when applicants ask what conditions an employer needs to meet for employer sponsorship.