# How easy is it to get sponsorship from the UK - Quantity Surveyor



## Petersaunders (Mar 18, 2010)

I am a quantity surveyor under 30 years old with ten years work experience and a degree in Quantity Surveying. I want to move to Oz and have been told the best route is through sponsorship. i really need some advice on how i go about this and how easy it is? I have emailed a few recruitment agencies with no luck!


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## Wanderer (Jun 16, 2007)

Petersaunders said:


> I am a quantity surveyor under 30 years old with ten years work experience and a degree in Quantity Surveying. I want to move to Oz and have been told the best route is through sponsorship. i really need some advice on how i go about this and how easy it is? I have emailed a few recruitment agencies with no luck!


It's a bit of a double barrelled situation right at the moment and the reason why people are saying employer sponsorship is the best route is because an overhaul of the skilled migration regulations is in progress right now with final situation not to be bedded down until later this year, sometime in second half.

One thing that does appear certain however is that the government appears to have its focus fixed on Employer Sponsorship visas as being the flagship for a demand driven skilled immigration program.
You can read of all changes, some already in place and others on the way @ 
What's New? Recent Changes in General Skilled Migration , there being a sticky thread with summary near top of this section.

The only problem with the Employer Sponsorship route is that whilst it has been extensively used for recruiting high demand professionals and trades people for construction areas, it is probably not being used so much for the likes of Construction/Engineering professionals including Quantity Surveyors unless an international company had an interest in a project and there was a severe shortage putting a project timeline in jeopardy.

Even with one of our larger resource projects in planning/early infastructure stages, I've seen a reference on the primary company's web site to not employing people unless they already have a suitable visa, so that's an indication of the government needing to do some education of industry on their policies.

And yes, it means the ES route is still something of a lucky dip for many.

I'd suggest that you may want to adopt a multi- pronged approach:
*1. *Get your qualifications assessed if you've not already done that and details @ Quantity Surveyor 2122-11 - Australian Skills Recognition Information
*2.* Get your 175 skilled application in as soon as you have that, it may be necessary that you do an IELTS course/exam to get additional points for English language ability so as to get sufficient points.
The current changes will not have a too significant effect on progressing applications for some professionals on the Critical Skill List [ CSL ] and Quantity Surveying is.
The CSL is due for revoking by about mid year but transitional arrangements re new priority schedule are to be put in place and at worst I'd expect it could be that you may have to nominate for a particular state to go on to a State Migration Plan [ SMP ] to reap benefit of an application higher priority consideration.

Depending on what state you might be interested in you could consider seeking State Sponsorship once you have your qualifications assessed and as soon as you had State Sponsorship your 175 visa gets classed as a 176, a CSL 176 a higher priority than a CSL 175.
I say depending on state for whereas most states sponsorship processing has in past normally taken 2-3 months, these are not normal times and processing could take far longer [ WA for instance ] and will take until after SMPs are introduced and so it may be better to wait.

You can have a read about all that and check out state sites from the second heading link on
Workers - Visas & Immigration , going to Visa Options and select outside Australia.

*3. *Being under 30, if you've not used a Working Holiday Visa and are eligible, then do so - Visa Options - Working Holiday - Visas & Immigration
You can have one of those whilst a 175/176 visa is in the system awaiting processing and the WHV gets you on the ground here and though some employers are reticent to employ WHV people because of a six months/employer limit, you may overcome that in advising you have a permanent residency skilled visa in the pipeline.

You could always go off doing whatever type of work you can find to have something of a break from Quantity Surveying and get to see Australia so as you'll have a better idea of where you may want to stick roots down.

*4.*Being on the ground here you'll also far increase your opportunities of employer sponsorship, applying direct to employers.
Some employers may offer just the temporary residency 457 visa in first place and though that has some thorns to it, the main one being the visa is tied to sponsorship _[ you can look for alternate sponsors if need be ]_, with professional positions there should not be problems and you may be able to get an employer prepared to look at a Permanent Residency Sponsorship if they know you have a PR application in the pipeline.

You do not need to pay double fees for there is a fee free application for ES PR visa applications where a skilled visa is pending, details under employee eligibility for ENS/RSMS applications - Visa Options - Employer Sponsored Workers - Workers - Visas & Immigration

You would need to apply for an offshore ENS/RSMS visa as the 175/176 visa is also offshore and when either are ready for granting you'll be notified of that and to advise Immi of your plans to have a short holiday abroad.

If you are far enough under 30 and wanted to give yourself a second string to security as far as being on a 457 visa, if in coming over on your first WHV you did three months of regional specific work _[ details in Visa info ]_ early on, you could keep eligibility for a second WHV up your sleeve.
A 457 would cancel your first WHV but if things did not work out so well for whatever reason and you were still not turned 31, you could apply for your second WHV.


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