Brits applying for residence from China your help appreciated Sender: Claire&Richard

Hello - this is a great forum, and your advice is invaluable. This is our story. Myself and boyfriend are British and work and live in Shanghai. We moved here in November 2002. I am 32, my boyfriend is 33. We want to apply for residence in Australia. My boyfriend will apply, and I will apply too, as a de-facto spouse. We are unmarried, but have been together 13 years.

We are in the process of beginning to found out which skills buttessment body we should apply under, my boyfriend is the general manager of an Engineering company here in Shanghai, but has only been in the position for the last 2 years. Before being promoted to GM, he was working as an operations manager for the same company here in China. In the UK he worked as a Mechanical engineer, for the same company 2 years prior to us moving to China.

First question - It seems we cannot apply to AIM for skills buttessment, as my bf has not had 5 years managerial experience, but we cannot apply under IEA because his degree is not accredited within the engineering body they refer to. As such should he apply under Vetbuttess, as an Engineer?

2nd question - My father lives in Australia, he has permanent residence, and is willing to sponsor us. Does he complete the form 40, and we just include this along with form 47sk? Because I am not the main applicant, can he still sponsor us based on my boyfriends relationship with him, even though we are not married?

3rd question - one week in August, to gather the relevant information we need to rays here in Shanghai, so should we arrange doctors appointments before we get to the UK and have the examinations done when we are there? - hopefully we would have submitted the Skills buttessment before then. Do the doctors send the xrays-health examinations results to Australia, or do they give them to us, so we can send the results to Oz from China as and when required?

I presume all we need to do is send off the police checks forms, and when completed, all the police need to do is then forward the results back to our address in China? Or is it easier to not tell them we are in China, and get them to use an address in the UK to send them to, and then they can be forwarded onto us by a family member?

4th question - 100k investment - we can afford to go through this process, as we presume we will need the extra points. If we want to move to Queensland, are we better investing in the Queensland government?

I am afraid all this seems so complicated, yet, we are alot clearer with certain aspects of the visa application process, after finding this website, it really has been invaluable, as the Australian Consulate here has been extremely unhelpful, and the immigration website does not seem to cater towards anyone in our position.

As such, any help or advice from you guys would be greatly appreciated. Claire

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