If you like the idea of Australia’s climate and lifestyle and are looking for a career challenge in a country with lots of opportunities – take the next step to find out more about Australia’s skilled working visas.
Your journey starts when you submit an expression of interest for a skilled visa through SkillSelect. By using SkillSelect the Australian government could invite you to lodge a visa application or you could be nominated by an Australian or state and territory government. Find out what you need to do to complete your expression of interest through SkillSelect.
SkillSelect is a service that helps Australia manage its skilled migration programme. It helps to ensure that the skilled migration programme is based on Australia’s economic needs. It supports the government in managing who can apply for skilled migration, when they can apply and in what numbers. As a result, the time taken to process a visa application is significantly reduced.
SkillSelect also helps address regional skill shortages. SkillSelect allows intending migrants to indicate if they are willing to live and work in regional Australia. This is of particular benefit to employers experiencing regional skill shortages and state and territory governments attempting to settle migrants in regional Australia. Contact IEAA if you need further information.
Skilled workers and business people interested in migrating to Australia can be considered for a skilled visa by submitting an Expression of Interest (EOI) through SkillSelect.
An EOI is an indication that you would like to be considered for a skilled visa. An EOI is not a visa application.
You will be asked to provide a range of information in your EOI depending on the visa you want to be considered for, such as:
- basic personal information
- nominated occupation
- work experience
- study and education
- level of English skills
- details of a skills assessment, related to your nominated occupation
- business and investment experience.
These skilled workers and business people can then be found and nominated for skilled visas by Australian employers or state and territory governments, or they might be invited by the Australian Government to lodge a visa application.
All people interested in the points based skilled migration or business investment and innovation visa programmes will need to submit an EOI and receive an invitation in order to lodge a visa application.
For more detail on what questions and information you will need to supply in your EOI, you should refer to the webpage of the visa you are interested in.
Which visas can be applied for?
- Business Talent (Permanent) visa (subclass 132)
- Business Innovation and Investment (Provisional) visa (subclass 188)
- Skilled Independent visa (subclass 189)
- Skilled – Nominated visa (subclass 190)
- Skilled – Nominated or Sponsored (Provisional) visa (subclass 489).
The following three visas can be applied for following an invitation by a SkillSelect-approved Australian employer:
- Temporary Work (Skilled) visa (subclass 457)
- Employer Nomination Scheme visa (subclass 186)
- Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme visa (subclass 187).
An occupation ceiling
An occupation ceiling will be applied to invitations to apply to migrate under the points based skilled visas of the general skilled migration programme. There will be a limit on how many invitations are issued in these subclasses for a particular occupation to ensure that the migration programme is not dominated by a small number of occupations.
Occupational ceilings do not apply to, State or Territory Nominated, Employer Sponsored or Business Innovation and Investment visa subclasses.
As there are high levels of interest from prospective skilled migrants in the below occupations, pro rata arrangements for this occupational group will apply. These arrangements are subject to change throughout the programme years:
- ICT Business and Systems Analysts
- Software and Applications Programmers
- Accountants.
The table at department fo immigration shows the occupation ceilings for the 2014-2015 programme year for each occupation on the Skilled Occupation List (SOL) by four-digit ANZSCO code unit group, and the number of invitations issued for each occupation in the current programme year to date:
For employers
This section will help you understand what you need to do to gain access to highly skilled workers to meet your current and future business obligations.
The benefits of using SkillSelect
SkillSelect can help you quickly and easily identify potential skilled workers with the essential skills and attributes needed to fill skill shortages, and to contact them.
This has a number of benefits for business, including the ability to reduce overseas advertising and recruitment costs, as well as helping address regional skill shortages. When an intending migrant submits their EOI, they can identify states and territories they are willing to live and work and indicate whether they would be willing to work in regional areas. Employers can then search for skilled workers who have indicated a willingness to work in specific regional areas.
Searching SkillSelect
You can search SkillSelect using a range of criteria such as the skilled worker’s occupation, qualifications or English language ability. You will be able to view details of skilled workers and then make contact with them to discuss sponsorship and employment. You will not have access to any personal information such as name, date of birth and other characteristics that could personally identify the skilled worker.
SkillSelect is a secure online service that requires a valid AUSKey for employers to gain access. If you are an Australian business, you can register for an AUSKey to securely and conveniently access a range of government online services. To obtain an AUSKey or find out more, visit the AUSKey website.
If you are one of the more than 800 000 existing AUSKey users, you are ready to use SkillSelect now.
Select the ‘Employers login’ button at the top of this page.
You will be asked to agree to the terms and conditions of SkillSelect when you register. If you do not comply with the terms and conditions your access to SkillSelect may be revoked
Identifying a potential skilled worker
If you find a potential skilled worker you can submit a contact request through SkillSelect to the skilled worker with your contact details. The skilled worker can then contact you to discuss employment opportunities.
Following contact with the skilled worker, you can decide to sponsor and employ them. Information about how to sponsor a skilled worker to migrate to Australia is available on our website:
- Employer Nomination Scheme (ENS)
- Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme (RSMS)
- Temporary Work (Skilled) (subclass 457) visa.
You can identify people through your own selection processes and you will still be able to sponsor them without the skilled worker submitting an EOI through SkillSelect.
