Appeals & Reviews

Have you received a notice of intention to cancel your visa or has your visa been refused?

The first thing to be aware of is that you have a limited amount of time to respond to the ‘Natural Justice Letter’. If you have received one of these, please contact us so we can assess your situation.

It is important to apply for a review on time and you will be able to stay in Australia on a Bridging Visa for as long as it takes for the review application to be processed.

You may be able to have the unfavourable decision reviewed by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT). Under certain circumstances, your visa is not reviewable, such as if your visa was refused or canceled under section 501 of the Migration Act 1958. 

Common Visa refusal reasons:

• You’ve breached the conditions of a previous visa
• You provided insufficient information to support your claims
• You didn’t meet the health and character requirements
• You have false, bogus or misleading information in your application
• The employer sponsoring you is not financially viable or there is no genuine need or the pay is not market salary rate

The AAT can make one of the following decisions:

• Affirm: The tribunal agrees with the Department’s decision so the decision stands
• Set aside: The Tribunal believes the Department’s decision should be changed and may replace the decision with a new one
• Remit: The AAT believes the Department should reconsider their decision while having regard to the directions made by the AAT

What if the Appeal fails?

In this case, you will have 2 options:

1. Apply to the Federal Court: if we believe there has been a legal error by the Department and/or AAT
2. Apply for Ministerial Intervention: we can write to the Minister for his personal discretion if you have a good reason

Section 48 Bar

If you are section 48 barred, you are prevented from lodging most visas while in Australia and will need to leave Australia. This can negatively affect your future applications.

Re-entry Ban

This will apply if you have overstayed your visa by more than 28 days, provided false documents or information to the Department, you are a risk to health, safety, or good order, you are convicted of an offence against the law of the Commonwealth or an Australian state or territory law, you breached a visa condition, you failed to maintain appropriate enrolment if you hold a student visa, or you are found to not be a genuine visitor.

You will not be permitted to return to Australia for up to three years.

This ban applies only to temporary visa holders, however if you are applying for a permanent visa, the Department will look at your immigration history when making the decision.

If you wish to find out whether a re-entry ban applies to you, please Book A Consultation With Us.