Dear SA-R,
If I look back over the ten years I have been a migration agent I've seen the processing times expand and contract like a concertina. Currently it's much better than the 12 months to 18 months people were experiencing if they lodged just before July 2004, and not as good as the 1-2 months people got if they lodged in the first weeks of July 2004. Not to mention the inequity of the two queues at that time and the blind indifference to releasing information we faced from the ASPC. Then there was the bubble of 14 April 2004 when a lot of people scrambled to get applications in to beat the last points increase. Those people also lost an extra six months of their lives in waiting.
Believe me, you are so, so lucky to have them telling you when the applications are being allocated to case officers, and to have them conceding that they're behind in receipting - we used to get receipts sent with the visa grants, if you hadn't paid by credit card you'd have had no idea where the application was.
Cheers,
George Lombard
www.austimmigration.com.au
-- www.austimmigration.com.au
