Strategic Visa Assessment: Australian Pathways for US Finance Professionals

As per the given scenario, Chantelle is a USA citizen, who is a successful stockbroker with over a decade of experience. Her job consists of buying and selling of stocks on behalf of clients. Chantelle is 36 years of age, with a partner and two kids of 4 and 6 years of age. Her educational background is in Finance, as she was awarded scholarship in Finance from New York university. For a person like Chantelle who is such talented and got years of experience, there should be few possible skilled visa options. To find out the best possible option for Chantelle and her family will have to go through each skilled visa option in detail to analyse which one would be best for Chantelle and her family.

Skill Visa Options to Chantelle and her Family

Subclass 189

Visa subclass 189 is for anyone who is seeking to satisfy the primary criteria for the grant of subclass 189 (skilled independent) visa in the point tested stream.[1] The base application charge that Chantelle would be looking at for this visa would be $4765 for just the primary applicant and for her partner would be $2385.[2] The applicant can apply for this visa while being overseas.[3] To be able to apply for this visa, Chantelle need an invitation from the minister to apply for this subclass. The applicant is not over the age of 45 so she is meeting the age criteria as well.[4] Chantelle would need to nominate a skilled occupation that the minister may have specified in the instrument.[5] The occupation list that Chantelle would need to look for her occupation would be under the list as specified by the Minister in the instrument.[6] As per the occupation list, the applicant would need to look for her occupation under the medium to short term strategic skill list. As persons who are issued an invitation to make an application for a subclass 189(Skilled Independent) Visa, the list they need to see would be the Medium and Long-term strategic skills list.[7] On looking under the specified list, the occupation of Stock Broker cannot be found under the Medium and Long-term strategic Skills list, hence this cannot be the visa option for Chantelle.

Subclass 190

The other visa that the applicant can consider would be the 190-visa subclass. If the applicant needs to apply for this visa, the applicant will use the form 1393 Internet.[8] The base application charge for the visa subclass 190 would be $4770 and for her partner would be $2385.[9] The applicant can be outside of Australia, which in the case of Chantelle is the case.[10] For any applicant seeking to satisfy the primary criteria, the applicant must have been invited by the Minister for a subclass 190, the applicant should not be over the age of 45.[11] The applicant would have to nominate an occupation as the skilled occupation list that the minster has specify for the visa.[12] As per the instrument, a person nominated by a state or Territory government agency and is issued an invitation to make an application for a subclass 190, would look for their occupation under the Medium and Longterm Strategic skills list and Short-term skilled occupation list.[13] The occupation of stockbroking dealer is on the short term skilled list, that does open up the door for Chantelle to consider.

For subclass 190 Visa, Chantelle needs to be invited by the Minister in writing.[14] At the time of invitation, the applicant need to have a relevant skill assessment from the relevant assessing authority and the assessment shouldn’t be done over 3 years ago.[15] The applicant would also need competent English, at the time of invitation.[16] For competent English, the person has taken a language test as specified by the Minister or hold a passport of a country as specified by the Minister.[17] Since Chantelle holds the passport of USA, she wouldn’t need to go for Language test, as she is the holder of a passport of USA that is specified by the Minister.[18] The applicant would need to meet the desired score which should not be less than the desired score stated in the invitation to apply.[19] The Minister may set pool mark and pass mark that the applicant would require to meet when applying for a general skill migration.[20] For the applications that will be made after the 16^th November 2019, the point that applicant need to meet for subclass 190 is 65 points.[21] The points based on age, qualification for subclass 190 are prescribed under reg2.26AC.[22] The point that Chantelle would be scoring based on the given information is included in the table below:

Categories	Points
Age	25
English	20
Work Experience in nominated occupation	15
Education	15
State Nomination	5

Based on the above chart, Chantelle would be scoring 75 points excluding the state nomination. If add the 5 points for state nomination than it would be 80 points, that is more than the required score of 65 points. Apart from the points, the nominating state or Territory government agency has not withdrawn the nomination.[23] The applicant would also need to satisfy the public interest criteria such as 4001, 4002 and few more.[24]

[1] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1137(2)(a)

[2] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1137(3)(1)(2)

[3] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1137(4)(b)

[4] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1137(4B)(1)(3)

[5] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1137(4B)(4)(a)

[6] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1137(4C)

[7] Migration (LIN 19/051: Specification of Occupations and Relevant Assessing Authorities) Instrument 2019 Part2 (7)(1)(a)

[8] Migration (Arrangements for Certain Skilled Visa Applications) Instrument (LIN 20/162) 2020 Part9(3)

[9] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1138(2)(a)(1)(2)

[10] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1138(3)(b)

[11] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1138(4)(1)(2)

[12] Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) Sch1 1138(4)(1)(3)