Deb&Andy
20th April 2007, 09:31 PM
Thought I'd post this as encouragement to those of you who (like us) may be worried that you won't make it.
Deb had a job offer early February with a start date of 21st May. we submitted our EOI on 12th Feb and were selected from the pool on the 14th.
We applied for the police checks immediately as, in the UK, it is via an application under the Data Protection Act and can take up to 6 weeks (it cost just £20 for Deb and I) but decided to wait to arrange the medicals until we had the Application to Apply for Residency, because of the costs involved.
The ITA arrived early March and we booked the medicals. They were done on 22nd March and cost over £1000 for the four of us. The results arrived on 30th March.
I took everything down to New Zealand House on 2nd April. Thanks to whoever (sorry I can't remember who) mentioned in a thread that if you take the application in person they will check that everything is there and correct at the time.
We emailed our case officer on 12th April with a gentle reminder that we were hoping to fly on the 10th May and asked that she let us know asap if there was anything else she needed. She repiled that there were a few secondary checks to be done and that she hoped to contact us shortly.
The passports arrived at home yesterday (19th April) including the Residency visas (now I know what people mean by 'blue stickers') and I've booked the flight. Arriving in Tauranga 12th May and are looking forward to our new life in New Zealand.
All we have to worry about now is finding somewhere to live. There are lots of houses to rent (we want to do that for 3 or 4 months while we look for a house to buy) but we haven't yet found one that will allow our dog and 2 cats. We may have to buy a tent.:laugh
Good luck to everyone who is going through the process and look forward to seeing you in NZ soon.
Andy
Deb had a job offer early February with a start date of 21st May. we submitted our EOI on 12th Feb and were selected from the pool on the 14th.
We applied for the police checks immediately as, in the UK, it is via an application under the Data Protection Act and can take up to 6 weeks (it cost just £20 for Deb and I) but decided to wait to arrange the medicals until we had the Application to Apply for Residency, because of the costs involved.
The ITA arrived early March and we booked the medicals. They were done on 22nd March and cost over £1000 for the four of us. The results arrived on 30th March.
I took everything down to New Zealand House on 2nd April. Thanks to whoever (sorry I can't remember who) mentioned in a thread that if you take the application in person they will check that everything is there and correct at the time.
We emailed our case officer on 12th April with a gentle reminder that we were hoping to fly on the 10th May and asked that she let us know asap if there was anything else she needed. She repiled that there were a few secondary checks to be done and that she hoped to contact us shortly.
The passports arrived at home yesterday (19th April) including the Residency visas (now I know what people mean by 'blue stickers') and I've booked the flight. Arriving in Tauranga 12th May and are looking forward to our new life in New Zealand.
All we have to worry about now is finding somewhere to live. There are lots of houses to rent (we want to do that for 3 or 4 months while we look for a house to buy) but we haven't yet found one that will allow our dog and 2 cats. We may have to buy a tent.:laugh
Good luck to everyone who is going through the process and look forward to seeing you in NZ soon.
Andy