Tourist Visa To Aus For Thai Wife

[frankpelagic]

I have been in a relationship with a Thai woman for 17 months, and have been married to her (in Australia) for the past 6 months. She has had two three month visas to Aus, Jan - Mar, and June-July, leaving well in advance of the due date each time. I am an Aus citizen, and work contracts in Australia. I have about $100k in the bank, and am returning next week for a new contract.

We applied for a one year tourist visa for her, two weeks ago today, and have heard nothing. Does anyone think two weeks (11 working days) is excessive, or am I panicking too early? If this seems to be too long, what can I do? VFS say they cannot help, and I emailed the embassy in BKK last week, but no reply.

All advice gratefully received.

[slug]

I had to deal with a similar situation last year. My wife applied for a one-year tourist visa and after a couple of weeks with no response from the embassy she called to ask what was going on.

The only answer they would give her was "don't call us, we'll call you".

After six weeks I was fed up and emailed the embassy, DFAT and the immigration minister with a stiff complaint, the next day the embassy had contacted my wife and everything was sorted out within a couple of days. I also got a follow up phone call from the immigration ministers office a week later to let me know that they were taking the matter up with the embassy.

I'd suggest you consider a similar course if you can't get a response from the embassy directly

cheers