This program year NZ citizens have the opportunity to apply for a 189 visa under much easier criteria than everyone else. How many NZers apply will directly affect how many 189s are available for the pro rata and non pro rata occupations.
Initially we estimated around 4,000 may apply out of the possible 70,000 who are eligible. Up until October 2017 (first 4 months) there have been 2,646 apply. Given there is likely to have been a surge initially I expect over the whole year that this will turn out to be around 5,000 primary applicants
However what is more important is how many have family members applying. A normal 189 application has approx 1.7 applicants applying (so the vast majority are single person applications). However the NZ family members have turned out to be larger than expected. , 2.4 applicants per application.
This is important as the 189 target is 43,990 total visa applicants which in the past has equated to 31,000 EOIs (allowing for wasted invites and then family members on top), Initially we anticipated around 4,000 NZ main applicants applying. Which meant 27,000 real invites for everyone else.
With NZers being larger families it means their expected 5,000 applicants with 2.4 people per application will take a massive 12,000 from the 43,990. That leaves now only 31,990 for everyone else. Or in effect just 23,000 invitations instead of what we expected 27,000.
The effect is that where we expected 1000 per round from now on, this will now be revised down to a lesser figure 800-900 from now until the end of June (on average) – UNLESS DIBP CHANGE THEIR EOI POLICY AND PUBLISHED QUOTAS FOR THE YEAR.
This is going to have a massive bad effect on waiting times.
When the November results come out from DIBP we will review our waiting time estimates.
Please understand we do not provide this data to be overly optimistic or pessimistic, we simply want to be realistic so that you know what to expect as DIBP change its settings.