Because I am the mail applicant I had to do a skills assessment with ANMAC. This was fairly straight forward except for the fact that I had to arrange for another certificate of good standing to be sent from SANC to ANMAC. Yup thats right... another R1650 and another 8 weeks of waiting. In addition to that, I also had to request for a certificate of good standing to be sent from AHPRA to ANMAC. That was about R500 and 1 week of waiting. FYI, I can't wait for the day that I don't have to interact with any South African government institutions!!! My skills assessment was finalized on 22 November 2016. I was so happy. I though oh well everything was done and that I was ready to apply for my 189 visa... surprise, surprise... Because of the fact that nursing was my second degree, I lost some points on work experience. I had a total of 55 points. For the 189 visa for nursing you require at least 60. My only option was to rewrite IELTS and obtain superior english. So to make a Loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooonnnnggggggggggggggg strory short, 1 Pearson test and 7 IELTS tests later, with other words, R25100 later I finally managed to obtain superior English on 13 may 2017 (I only received my results on the 26th of May though). Because of the extra 20 points, I managed to have 65 point. I immediately updated my skillselect account. We received an Invite 5 days later. So now our timeline looks as follows:
- Invite: 3 June 2017
- Application Lodged: 14 June 2017 (All documents uploaded except medicals)
- Medicals:11 July 2017
- CO contacted for extra documents: 7 August 2017 (28 days given to respond)
~Extra documents:
1) A letter of good conduct from my husband's company.
2) A Panama pcc for my husband. We weren't sure why this was asked, because my husband (he is a Sailor) has never been onshore Panama, nor has he sailed on a Panama flagged ship for a period of 12 months or longer. As per the DIBP you only have to provide pcc for countries which you have been in for 12 months or longer in the past 10 years. My husband has only sailed on 2 Panama flagged ships for an accumulative period of 11 months and 5 days. We were unable to obtain a Panama pcc.
We uploaded the letter of good conduct, the correspondence with the Panama consulate, in which they stated that they won't be able to assist us, and a letter of consideration which I wrote. The letter explains why we were unable to obtain the pcc, and it requests the DIBP to be considerate with regards to our circumstances.
- Extra documentation uploaded 19 Aug
- Current application status: Assessment in progress
It is the 6th of September and we are so stressed and so completely freaked out. But as I said...just roll with the punches... I really really really hope we will hear something soon.
Cheers!
