Australian tourist visa question - DUI

[Hulkified]

We have been told by a lady at vfs that my girlfriend does not need to put her DUI on her visa application (question 38). She was charged in august last year went to court and was fined plus 2 years good behaviour. I know that in future visa's she will be asked for a police report and this DUI will be expunged in 2015.

So My question is do any of you know if she needs to declare a DUI on the application or is the vfs lady correct due to it being a minor offence it isn't required?

[Surin13]

If they were convicted then you are required to put it down as per question 38.

DUI isn't considered a major issue and would not be grounds for rejection of a visa, on the other hand failing to put it down and getting caught out (now or in the future) would be.

Edited February 18, 2014 by Surin13

[Will27]

If they were convicted then you are required to put it down as per question 38.

DUI isn't considered a major issue and would not be grounds for rejection of a visa, on the other hand failing to put it down and getting caught out (now or in the future) would be.

Surin13 is spot on.

It's always best not to listen to glorified couriers at VFS and research the correct information yourself.

[Old Croc]

As stated DUI is classified as a criminal offense in Australia. However there are many different levels of that offence and differing fine structures from state to state.

Low blood alcohol level offences generally attract automatic fines and/or suspensions without a court appearance.

A stand alone DUI offense on a visa application wouldn't be given more than a cursory glance at an embassy, and would be a nuisance if stated on an arrival card. The Immigration Officer at the arrival airport doesn't want to have to interview every passenger who declares these types of traffic offences.

Entry refusal based on character grounds would normally only result if the pax had had serious goal time.

[Hulkified]

Just coming back to update.

After choosing to disclose the DUI we were told after 5 days that she needed to provide some paper from the courthouse (said she knew what they needed left it in her hands). We had 10 days to provide the paper was friday afternoon. She got her paper on monday morning no problems and went to Bangkok but forgot her receipt so couldn't hand it in. We got that sorted via a translator downstairs doing it on Tuesday

The following thursday get another phone call telling us that the paper is not exactly what they needed. What she did need was a full case report (how it was explained to me) on her DUI. Court was telling us 1 months before she could get her papers. I left Thailand 9 days from then, we still had no contact saying the visa application was voided yet but we did know we would get the paper on friday. After calling VFS and telling them they will have the paper monday morning in hopes they wouldn't void the appilcation on thursday/friday everything was delivered on Monday.

Yesterday we were successful on a 3 month visa, so being honest worked out for the best.

If anyone else has a issue like this make sure you get the full case file before submitting you visa application will save a lot of headaches before hand.

[Thanet]

As others have said here, details of all convictions must be disclosed when applying for any Australian visa. Exclusion from Australia on character grounds is usually only for offences that resulted in a jail sentence (including a suspended sentence) of one year or more, or in cases where the applicant is considered to be an ongoing threat to the public good. A DUI conviction that did not result in such a sentence will not be considered serious enough to warrant exclusion from Australia.

If the offence is not disclosed during application, and is found out later on, the visa will likely be cancelled and / or the holder refused entry.