[Lupin]

Hello all. I've been reading this forum for a while so I thought I'd register and say hello now that our journey has begun.

We're a family of four, husband is a UK and NZ citizen and the rest of us are applying for PR under the partnership category. Our children are 8 and 3, my husband is in the final months of a nurse training course and I'm an OU student. We hope to move to Hawkes Bay within the year. We travelled in NZ five years ago with our eldest daughter and fell in love. We were delighted to find that my husband was a citizen by descent, although unfortunatly the children are not.

So far I've had blood tests done and am off for an X-ray this morning. Our medicals are in three weeks time. I've sent off for police check about a week ago and have made inroads on the onerous form filling.

We'd like to fly MalaysianAir because we had sucha good experience with them previously (and have suffered a bad experience with another airline to sharpen the experience!) and would like to stop in the airport hotel. Just a bit bothered by only having a 20kg baggage allowance, especially as I don't think we'll be able to afford a shipping container so will be heading out with the bare minimum!!

So that's us. I feel fairly confident that our application will be successful (I BET I eat those words!!!!) as we're all pretty healthy, but it's still quite a hassle and unbelievably expensive. But we know it will be worth it :)

[MB]

Welcome, Lupin77!

As you have probably seen, there are a number of forum folks applying in your category (my family did not, but you're in very good company on this forum). Maybe they will help steer you in the direction of Partnership-cateogry threads that they have found particularly useful.

Looking forward to hearing more details about your family and plans.

This is an excellent forum. The quality and quantity of advice, and the overwhelming air of goodwill, is wonderful. :nice1

[zardell]

Hi Lupin (love that name !!) and WELCOME to the forum.

As MB says, we are a friendly lot on here, nosey (we like piccies) but friendly.

Good luck with your x-rays this morning.....I'm sure all will be fine.

Julie

xx

[westies]

Hello and welcome
It was abit like reading about us, we have 2 girls aged 8 & 3, came out in 2001 with our eldest daughter and loved it, I am a nurse and started work 3 days ago after arriving in Auckland 4 weeks ago, good luck to you and keep us posted!!
Tracey

[Trigirl]

Hi Lupin

Welcome and good luck with the application. It is quite a hassle. My partner is taking ours in person today and I am very glad its finally done!

I'm another OU student (currently studying pure maths). Have you been able to find out anything about continuing to study in NZ - I'd love to carry on and get a maths degree but it seems impossible.

Mandy

[Lupin]

I'd be very interested in the experiences of others applying or applied under the partnership category. I'm not sure what time frame to expect when I finally submit the wretched thing!

Mandy, I don't think you can continue with OU study in NZ....at least not by the rules. There is the Open Polytechnic of NZ which is sort of affiliated (I think ) with the OU and has a few of their courses available, but not the one I'd like to do next.

X-ray all done.....but now I've got this sealed envelope, which I *must not* open apparently, but because I had to delay the medicals (wasn't sure if littlest's passport and my blood test results would be back in time for initial booking tomorrow so I moved it on, only to find that of course everything came through super quick!) I now have to live with this envelope for three weeks, which I'm itching to open.

Thanks for the lovely welcome :)

[tigerlily]

Welcome to you and your family!

I think that there are other options for sending your belongings- such as shipping your books media rate, or a freight forwarding service. This thread:
http://www.emigratenz.org/forum/showthread.php?t=5809
dealt with a similar question. In the Making The Move part of this forum there have been several threads about what is worth taking/expensive to replace.

Best of luck!

[mossum]

Hi Lupin ,

We recently applied under the family category - & were told would be about 4 months - in the end it was 3 weeks before we had a verbal yes & that was after a few queries !!! - Not sure if we struck lucky or what . Now the big headache selling the house - sold after a few days but alas it all went blaaarrrgg on saturday - oh well ...

good luck with your rads - its v v quick - not to sure just how much good mine were - lol all you could see was 2 round patches Where my rather well formed bosom obscured most of my lungs - Dh thought it was hilarious :p

nice to meet you

vic

[Lupin]

Thanks Tigerlily for the thread link....I got a quote of about £150 per cubic metre from cargobookers to shift from my door to Auckland, which seems pretty reasonable. Obviously I want to ship the kids toys, my books, a few boxes of this and that and our bikes and, as all the instruments (5, stringed) will have to come as hand luggage or something, I think that's about it. Our furniture is shabby donations (gratefully received but not worth shipping) and all the electrical stuff bar a nice digital radio (any ideas if that would work in NZ...I'm not very techie) and a dyson barely does the job they were designed for I'm quite happy to go light. Think I'll get some more quotes with the companies mentioned on that thread and investigate insurance etc.

Vic, that's an encouraging timescale!

I opened the envelope and of course everything was fine so now I have three weeks to convincingly stick it back down :o

[kiwidebs]

Hi and welcome

My husband applied under the partnership route (I'm a Kiwi) and it took about a month from handing everything in at NZ house to PR in principle. We didn't get his passport stamped for a few months as we hadn't sold our house at that time. Once you get PR you have six months to pay your Migration Levy thingy, then 12 months to get it all validated by arriving in NZ. So 18 months to sort things out if you need it.

Debs, Mark, Gemma (4) and Cameron (2)

Finally here and loving it!! :raebanana

[dawn]

Hi, welcome and good luck!

I applied under the partnership category, very similar situation to yours, but kids are older.

It took 5(ish) weeks from submission to VISA's received, (see my signature), it's almost as if it's a forgone conclusion. My application would have been processed quicker but I had a 2 week delay because of a problem with my blood test.

Air New Zealand offer a baggage allowance of 2 x 23kg for each passenger (if you fly on NZ1 via Los Angeles - with no stopover), so it may be worth looking at that. We've flown Malaysia and I agree, they are great, but we're going on NZ1 one-way in July - and I admit, the baggage allowance was a big big factor in our flight choice.

Good luck and let us know how it all goes.

BTW, you only send the xrays to NZIS if there is a problem with them, they don't need to see them if everything is ok. I've had ours framed!! - Yeah I know, I'm wierd.

[Mexican in NZ]

Hi there !!!
I am a bit surprised u are only allowed to bring 20kg of luggage per person as i flew las year March to NZ from LA and the max was 35kg x2 per person!!! plus your carry on bag...my husband and i managed to fit so much!!
Hope u can c if u r allowed to bring more as u will be residing here i read a post b4 saying that the airline allowed them to bring more things cos they were going to b here in NZ living.
Well, prob i was just dreaming but it will be worthy if u can research more about it.
Wish you the best and God Bless you and your family!!
Adriana

[Smiler]

Adriana

The baggage allowance with NZ airlines was reduced unless you had booked your ticket by mid march. :wah

Welcome Lupin and family to the forum. :raebanana

[katandbob]

Adriana

The baggage allowance with NZ airlines was reduced unless you had booked your ticket by mid march.

Welcome Lupin and family to the forum. :raebanana

And other airlines (such as Cathay) state that if you want additional luggage allowance, you must state it at the begining of the query (no field on most online flight sites - or theirs either) then they bump up the price...

for example...I got ours for £300 each plus taxes etc....I then contacted Travelbag, who said yep you can have double...send copy of visa.

then the came back confused as Cathay wouldnt grant it - they gave me the contact no and I tried....the gist of it was, that I could upgrade to "A MIGRANT TICKET" for the extra baggage allowance - since Oct 05 they had changed the rules to state that you must PAY full price to get extra baggage allowance, not buy discounted tickets -

This then worked out at the princely sum of £699 EACH!!!!! :p

DOH.......told them I was not paying £399 each for 20kg weight!

(its costing me £250 to ship 1 cubic metre!)

So we are traveling lite...................at least we wont have a gizillion bags to contend with.............AND I HAVE BEEN PROMISED A SHOPPING SPREE :laugh :raebanana

Kat

[Lupin]

Migrant levy???
Blissfully unaware of this up until now but it doesn't sound good :uhoh

[Hannah]

Hi Lupin
Welcome
We flew Malaysian Air and got a cheapo ticket. We were told 20kg and when the four of us got the airport with our 80kg exact luggage between us we said 'phew' and the check in guy said we needn't have worried as they will actually let you go up to 30kg without penalty. He said they don't advertise it officially as people often go over 20kg and that would just encourage them to go over 30kg instead. That was on a visitor visa - i have heard the luggage allowance will be increased even further if you tell them it's a one way trip to take up residency but not sure if there are cost implications.

My partner flew back to UK this morning with a 27kg bag on the return portion of his ticket which says 'up to 20kg' so i'll let you know if he gets away with it!!!

Hannah

[Hannah]

Ps that's in addition to a 7kg per person hand luggage allowance (but size of hand luggage bag is limited to equivalent of a small sports bag

[Hannah]

Sorry, keep doing new posts as i keep forgetting to add things!
Regarding OU, i'm an ex OU student and you can carry on with OU although you will pay higher course fees (ironically you will be considered and international/overseas student!) because of higher costs in sending materials. Also, you won't be able to access tutorials and residentials of course, not sure if overseas students can phone a tutor though. I know the OU have lots more technology now - video conferencing, teleconferencing and chat room stuff is pretty standard on some courses!
There is an Open Polytechnic in NZ, same principle as OU, but i'm not sold on it. Doesn't seem as good and no way offers the same diversity and quality of courses in my opinion. But then every other distance learning provider has tons to live up to when compared to the OU. I loved it. It changed my whole outlook on life and I woudn't be here in NZ doing the job i'm doing without having got my OU degree!

hannah

[Lupin]

That's interesting Hannah. I think I'll call the OU and chat to them about it. My FIL is an OU tutor and he thought it ridiculous when I said I didn't think I'd be able to continue. I'm not bothered about tutorials, phone chats etc...I'm a really unsociable lighthouse learner and studying alone really suits me. I would so like to do another course next year, so thanks for the info I'll investigate :)

Also when I spoke to flightcentre and I moaned about baggage he advised me to just turn up with more and chance it, so that seems congrous with what you're saying.

I can't seem to find out anything about this migrant levy...anyone know how much for a family of four? Thanks all.

[Questor]

It's £120 pp up to a maximum of (I THINK) £480 per application

[Lupin]

Thanks Questor :)

I had initially hoped to get this whole migrating thing wrapped up for under £5000, but that's looking less and less likely!!

[Questor]

Yeah, charges seem to pop up out of nowhere don't they?!!

[Oregonkiwi]

I can't seem to find out anything about this migrant levy...anyone know how much for a family of four? Thanks all.

You can go to the NZIS website and download the Guide to Fees, all the info about fees is in there. :nice1