Invite To Wedding In Australia

[stevemiddie]

Hi.

My father is remarrying in Australia ( we are Brits ) and i live in Thailand with my Thai wife. The wedding is not until April 2008 but i would like to book flight tickets early for a good price.

What problems will my Thai wife face and/or what requirements as regards paperwork do we have to show in Australia. I have never been there. We only intend to stay for 1 week due to the fact we both work.

Do we need to contact the Aussie Embassy now? Or can we go in on a tourist type visa?

Any help would be appreciated. Many thanks.

[gburns57au]

Hi.

My father is remarrying in Australia ( we are Brits ) and i live in Thailand with my Thai wife. The wedding is not until April 2008 but i would like to book flight tickets early for a good price.

What problems will my Thai wife face and/or what requirements as regards paperwork do we have to show in Australia. I have never been there. We only intend to stay for 1 week due to the fact we both work.

Do we need to contact the Aussie Embassy now? Or can we go in on a tourist type visa?

Any help would be appreciated. Many thanks.

You can apply online for the tourist visa

Your wife will have to lodge an application at the VFS office in BKK......

Apply 3 or less months beforehand as the visa has a 3 month limit for use...

http://www.immi.gov.au/immigration.htm

For further info.

[Thanyaburi Mac]

Hi.

My father is remarrying in Australia ( we are Brits ) and i live in Thailand with my Thai wife. The wedding is not until April 2008 but i would like to book flight tickets early for a good price.

What problems will my Thai wife face and/or what requirements as regards paperwork do we have to show in Australia. I have never been there. We only intend to stay for 1 week due to the fact we both work.

Do we need to contact the Aussie Embassy now? Or can we go in on a tourist type visa?

Any help would be appreciated. Many thanks.

You can apply online for the tourist visa

Your wife will have to lodge an application at the VFS office in BKK......

Apply 3 or less months beforehand as the visa has a 3 month limit for use...

http://www.immi.gov.au/immigration.htm

For further info.

It's been 9 years since my Thai wife & I went to Oz for a friend's wedding.  BTW, she wasn't my wife then.

We both went in for the interview after filling out both applications with some backup paperwork, mostly mine showing that I'd retired here.  Oh, yes, she already had a 10-year U.S. visa and owned our house.

I also had a stack of emails between the folks in Oz and myself concerning trip planning, where to stay, some travel by road from Sydney up to Canberra, where to find VB, etc.

We hit the window and a Thai gal took our applications, passports, my verbal explanation and the emails (nothing else), and told us to sit down as it might be 20 minutes or so.

20 minutes later we were called up to the window by the same Thai gal and handed our passports. I asked about the interview, she said visas already in both passports, no interview.

Pretty simple and quick I must say!!

Mac

[gburns57au]

and a long time ago Mac....it has changed.

[Manchester]

Many thanks guys.

[fishhooks]

This was also a long time ago, but my then Shanghainese girlfriend visited me in Australia on a Tourist Visa in 1991.

After a few months here, we decided to marry and Immigration (Dandenong in Melbourne) were fantastic and could not have been more helpful.

Thus the Tourist Visa soon grew to Permanent Residence for her.

Okay, it was a good marriage but like many others did not last, so we have since happily gone our own ways.

I now have a Thai fiancee, two year provable relationship but I don't think I will try this method again, 'as even though on the books it may be possible', I think Immigration would not be as helpful.

A bit off-topic but I thought I would ask any forum member who may have done this recently, if it is still possible?

[gburns57au]

This was also a long time ago, but my then Shanghainese girlfriend visited me in Australia on a Tourist Visa in 1991.

After a few months here, we decided to marry and Immigration (Dandenong in Melbourne) were fantastic and could not have been more helpful.

Thus the Tourist Visa soon grew to Permanent Residence for her.

Okay, it was a good marriage but like many others did not last, so we have since happily gone our own ways.

I now have a Thai fiancee, two year provable relationship but I don't think I will try this method again, 'as even though on the books it may be possible', I think Immigration would not be as helpful.

A bit off-topic but I thought I would ask any forum member who may have done this recently, if it is still possible?

Yes, it is for you to sponsor another girl to Oz....there is a limit though....

You will not be able to bring her for a holiday and then marry and apply for a spouse visa from here. You can marry here on a tourist visa but she will need to apply for a spouse visa from Thailand.

You could use the fiance visa which allows her to come for nine months BUT you must marry and apply for the Temp Res visa before the nine months expires.

[david96]

This was also a long time ago, but my then Shanghainese girlfriend visited me in Australia on a Tourist Visa in 1991.

After a few months here, we decided to marry and Immigration (Dandenong in Melbourne) were fantastic and could not have been more helpful.

Thus the Tourist Visa soon grew to Permanent Residence for her.

Okay, it was a good marriage but like many others did not last, so we have since happily gone our own ways.

I now have a Thai fiancee, two year provable relationship but I don't think I will try this method again, 'as even though on the books it may be possible', I think Immigration would not be as helpful.

A bit off-topic but I thought I would ask any forum member who may have done this recently, if it is still possible?

Under the Migration Regulations 1994 an amendment was added (1.20J)to prevent serial sponsorships this was retrospective from 1/11/1996.Two sponsorships in a lifetime not less than 5 years apart. Ref "Migration Regulations 1994"

[fishhooks]

david96:

Thanks for that, luckily this will be the 2nd (and last) and 17 years apart!

[fishhooks]

I take it, sponsorship of your wife in the first instance if you go the Tourist Visa route, doesn't interact with later sponsorship of your wife for a Partner Visa.

[david96]

That is correct you do not sponsor for a tourist visa under the Migration Regulations of 1994.

[gburns57au]

That is correct you do not sponsor for a tourist visa under the Migration Regulations of 1994.

However as he brought the first girl over on a tourist visa and then it was changed to a permanant visa, the question is....did he sponsor her for the permanant visa previously.

If he did then that is strike one.

[david96]

I the girl received an "immigration advantage " DIAC may see this as equivalent to sponsorship. In 1996 the Goverment brought in amendments such as the 1.20j rule and the 2 year probation period to prevent abuses to the migration system under the previous regime where up to 70% ( in 1994/1995 ) of migration applications where for spouse,financee,and family reunion. And it was supposed to stop sham mariages, and the requirement that all sponsors have to be Australian citizens for these classes of visa was also introduced.