Hi What as happened to the queue calculator,we lodged our CPV application 8th April 08 it said 1,440 on the 8th August it said 1,350 and now it reads 380,could this mean things are on the move or is it a mistake? We live in hope.

Hi David

The 380 people you mention are people whose CPV applications had already been placed in the Queue on or before 8th April 2008, and who were still awaiting the grants of their CPVs on the date when the Queue Calculator was last updated, which I think was one day last week.

The figures on the calculator are only approximate anyway, plus they only update the thing once a month. If you look at the CPV 143 for 31st July 2008, some 780 people were in the Queue by that date.

Those people had all been assessed as meeting all the "threshold criteria" for their CPV 143s, including their medicals and police checks.

I had a good look at the Calculator last night. Evidently they began compiling the figures for it in October 2007 because there are no figures for 30th September 2007. It appears that some 30 or so people who had met the threshold criteria on or before 31st Oct 2007 are STILL awaiting their CPVs nearly a year later.

Jorgon, one of the latest contributors to the thread below, is one of them:

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=474169&page=72

(Post #1079 on Page 27 of the thread.)

He has also contributed to the main Poms in Oz thread on this topic, which is here:

http://www.pomsinoz.com/forum/migration-issues/32394-co...-parent-visa-23.html

I'm Gollywobbler on Poms In Oz. I didn't have a clue about who Poms in Oz were when I first joined it so I was wary of using my real name on it. It is different on here because I knew before I joined this forum that Alan Collett can be trusted implicitly. He wasn't an "internet stranger" if you see what I mean.

Anyhow, Jorgon has said on Poms in Oz when his meds etc were done (Sept 2007, I think) but he has also said that he is not in a hurry for his own CPV 143 to be granted.

At the moment, the Perth Offshore Parents Centre (the POPC) are taking about 6 weeks to acknowledge lodgement of CPV applications and then about a year elapses between the lodgement date of the application (given in the ack letter) and the date when a Case Officer makes contact to start the final processing.

On one of the threads, somebody e-mailed the POPC not long ago asking about timelines. He or she published the text of the response. The response is about 12 months till the CO gets in touch and about another 6 months in total before the CPV 143 is likely to be granted.

The Service Standard/Ministerial Target for the CPV 143 is 12-15 months. The POPC are not meeting that at the moment, but this is probably because of the backlog that built up during the several months over 2007/8 when they couldn't grant any more visas.

They said in July that they hoped to clear the backlog by the end of August 2008. As at 30th June 2008 (the day before they could start granting visas again) there were some 1,980 CPV applicants in the Queue. By 31st July, that was down to 780 or so.

The next lot of figures, which will be published sometime towards the end of September 2008, should start to show that the worst of the backlog has been cleared, and the calculator might make more sense after that.

That said, are they actually going to keep it working anyway until the next time they have to apply the cap to the quota? I've no idea for sure. I think they probably will because even 6,500 visas a year is not enough to satisfy the demand. It should cover most of the demand but the ratio won't be 1:1. I don't think it is as bad as 2:1. I reckon about 1.3:1 or so at present (just instinct) but I think this will rise. We will be able to deduce more in December when DIAC publish their annual report for 2008/9.

I will (hopefully later today) publish a proper update about all this on Poms in Oz. In it, I will give all the links that people may wish to click on so that they can consider for themselves what DIAC are saying (much of it garbled, but that is par for the course with their "updates"!)

Cheers

Gill

Received yesterday (26/08/2008) in an email from a case officer at POPC:

" ... I was informed that the visa quota allocated for this year is being rapidly used up and there might not be any visas left by the end of September ..."

Best regards.

Hi Alan

I saw your new article dated 27th August.

I'm not convinced. If the Calculator is half-truthful, on 30th June 2008 there were 1,960 Queued CPV 143 applications and 170 CPV 173, making 2,130 in total.

That total had reduced to 930 by 31st July, ergo they granted 1,200 visas during July.

We know that in the early part of 2008 they were not Queueing the applicants until after police and meds clearance. Also, at the beginning of Feb the POPC said that they had "around 1,000 applicants" in the Queue by end January 2008. Double that number by the end of June is a credible idea.

Sure they are adding to the Queue probably daily and also substracting from it daily. But 6,500/1,200 produces 5.4 months.

There is simply no way they have enough staff to grant 6,500 visas in 3 months. Surely they would also need MUCH higher figures in the Calculator in order to get through 6,500 grants even in 5 months?

The POPC also said at one stage that at the point when they added Parents to the Queue, they were reserving visas for them at the same time.

In the last 5 weeks or so, that story has changed with regard to NCPs, but has it also changed for the CPs?

http://www.immi.gov.au/gateways/agents/news/health-character-requirements.htm

They have also been devising their "Information Strategy" since early January according to an e-mail that I saw from His Nibs. With a singular lack of success, it would seem...

Nobody in the CPV Queue has been told a Queue Date, in spite of the promises on the website.

http://www.immi.gov.au/migrants/family/parent-visa-processing-priorities.htm

The Calculator does not and cannot work unless applicants are told their Queue Dates. It is a completely pointless idea without that piece of information.

Shall I rattle a few cages at the POPC or would you prefer to tackle it, please?

Cheers

Gill

Feel able to make enquiries of POPC, Gill.

I will also seek to exchange an email with one of my contacts at POPC in an effort to find out whether the CPV queue calculator on the DIAC website is accurate.

Best regards.

PS. I have not seen any correspondence from POPC that indicates our CP clients are being formally queued. Indeed, why would applications be queued if they can be progressed under the existing program numbers?

I have asked my contact at POPC whether we can expect to see queuing being implemented in the near future.

Given an absence of queuing in our caseload I wonder whether the stats from the calculator on the DIAC website mean a great deal ... are you aware of any applicants with a formal queue date, Gill?

We are seeing applications lodged in August 2007 currently being assessed by case officers at POPC. If the 2008/09 program is indeed being consumed quickly I would expect formal queuing to be applied to applicants from the last ¼ of 2007 onwards.

Hi Alan

Thanks for this. Nope. Not a soul has told me that they have been told of their 'queue date.' However, the DIAC website doesn't say that they will be told. It says they will be given a queue date and added to the queue....

I agree with the rest of your suppositions. The only way that 930 applicants outstanding on 31st July 2008 translates into running out of visas by the end of September 2008 is in a situation where the Calculator is telling us only about the number of applications that were formally Queued in 2007/8 and we are supposed to work out that a number of applicants never make it into the Queue.

If that is the premise they are relying on, though, is there any real value in the Calculator? I can't see how it is useful at all unless the visa applicant knows his/her Queue Date plus we get clarification of whether or not some applicants never go into the Queue. The website also says that the Queue will only be used if all 6,500 visas have been allocated during the 2008/9 year. To allocate all 6,500 by the end of September would certainly be possible, I reckon, particularly if "parents" includes CPV applicants in the 30th July statement:

http://www.immi.gov.au/gateways/agents/news/health-character-requirements.htm

I think we could see a situation where at the end of September, all 6,500 visas have been earmarked for individual applicants, but the actual granting of the visas will probably continue for a lot longer especially if the visas are allocated before the meds and pccs have been done.

The website also says very firmly that once a Queue Date is given, it is an immovable feast (much like the Initial Entry Date.) The visas will then get the final spit, polish & grant in strict Queue Date order, it says.

Which begs the question of when do they apply Ministerial Direction 99 or whatever it is? The thing described in Factsheet 37:

http://www.immi.gov.au/media/fact-sheets/37processing.htm

Does that have to be complied with before a Queue Date is given? If so, will they backdate the Queue Date for somebody at the top of the pecking order? I've asked the POPC to clarify this. Would they be likely to work out a person's place in the pecking order when they first get the application? Dunno.

I've said that everyone is really confused because we don't understand exactly what DIAC/the Calculator is trying to tell us, so I've asked if they could be kind enough to get someone to write a couple of short paragraphs explaining how all this works.

I've sent them the link to your article of 27th August, though, so they might decide to explain it all to you rather than to me. (You can do the maths accurately, unlike me!)

I've also sent the links to the Poms in Oz and BE threads and have suggested that a quick glance at the final 2 or 3 pages of each of those will show them what sort of questions everyone is confused about, where the speculation is inaccurate & so forth. If they can see the problem for themselves, it should be easy for a clear-headed CO to write something concise which will clear up the mystery, I hope!

Cheers

Gill

For what it is worth the following is the email I received from POPC on 15 Aug.
"I can confirm that your application has been received by the Perth Offshore Parents Centre (POPC). The application was received on 01 April 2008.
For Contributory Parent visa categories (subclasses CA-143 and UT-173),it is taking approximately 10 - 12 months from lodgement date until the case is allocated to a case officer. Your application is registered and
awaiting allocation, currently we are processing applications that we received in the last week of July 2007 for allocation to case officers.
Once your case is allocated to a Case Officer, they will make an assessment of the application and request outstanding documents such as a police clearance certificate.
The processing times for the 143 and 173 are the same.

As your application has not yet been assessed it will not have a queue date in which to place in the online queue calculator. Once it has been the case officer will advise you what is your queue date. This program year financial year)the quota of places for the 143/173 combined is 5900. The calculator will allow for this, therefore choose the visa type
that you applied for when using the calculator".

Does this add to the picture? I think I am more confused now than ever!

Hellooo jmm!

Thank you very much indeed for your input and yes it does add an enormous amount to the picture.

1. Hmmmm. They have divvied the total quota into 600 visas for onshore applicants and 5,900 for offshore CPVs. The actual split is not that interesting. It tallies with demand:

http://www.immi.gov.au/media/media-releases/2008/d08036.htm

What intrigues me about it is that they split the quota between the onshore and offshore visas in the same way about 18 months ago and duly harrumphed about it for a while on the website. Then they quietly dumped the idea and never did explain why.

So I wonder why they have revived the idea again?

2. Bingo! The POPC have come out of the woodwork and have said that they do intend to tell people what their Queue Date is, but prolly not till about a year after the date of lodgement.

So your information really is very helpful indeed.

Thank you again.

Best wishes

Gill

I think I will just go to sleep until about this time next year and then live in hope!

Hi again, David

Somebody posting on the big CPV thread on British Expats has had an e-mail from the POPC confirming what they told jmm and making things even clearer.

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=474169&page=75

Please see Jean58's post at #1116 on Page 75.

The POPC's responses to Jean and jmm don't really explain what is going on in the background but both e-mails do make it clear that the Calculator will not produce any figures you can rely on until your CO has told you your queue date.

Best wishes

Gill

I have a reply from POPC, which reads as follows:

"I am able to advise that Contibutory Parent visa applications have not been formally queued at this stage, however it is anticipated that this may occur some time in October 2008, as the number of visas allocated to the program year are granted.

Once applications are formally queued clients will be advised in writing by the POPC."

Best regards.

I would suspect the calculator is automated as the following 2 week slots were checked and the queue size appears to be following a predicable figure, it is may be an allocation figure.

These are for Parent Contributory Visas:

10.7.08 - 190
24.7.08 - 220
07.8.08 - 250
21.8.08 - 270
04.9.08 - 310
18.9.08 - 340
02.10.08 - 370 ...........

what do those dates mean? eg 10.7.08 - 190 - does that mean if you lodged the application on the 10/7/08 you have 190 people ahead of you...or is it a date the CO gives you somewhere along the line? didn't think the queue was operational yet?

Hiya

What is happening at present is that when COs contact the visa applicants or their agents the COs are adding people to the "queue" but it is partly an experiment to make sure that the Queue Calculator is working properly.

The POPC have said that they do expect to implement the formal Queueing process before the end of 2008 because they are reaching the stage where they will have to stop granting visas from the 2008/9 allocation because they will have used them all up.

They are saying that when they can't grant any more then they will start queuing the applications formally and will notify people of their Queue Dates.

Best wishes

Gill