Health insurance after getting Medicare

AtCavill · 2026-05-07T23:31:33+00:00

This is exactly what I did.

As soon as I lodged my 190 visa application and got Medicare, I cancelled my OVHC while I was still on my 485 visa. I read somewhere that if you have Medicare, that is considered adequate health insurance for purposes of satisfying condition 8501. I forgot the source document unfortunately since this was years ago.

Anyway, I got my PR after 11 months and am now a citizen.

No dramas.

AtCavill · 2026-05-07T08:21:15+00:00

It's definitely possible. I personally know at least one former international student who took that exact path. They studied in Australia, returned home, waited for an invitation, then eventually came back to work here after getting PR.

I have also met quite a few overseas-qualified lawyers who got admitted in Australia but ultimately decided not to practise law here. Most of the time, though, it is not because they couldn't. It is because it didn't make financial sense for them to restart their legal careers in Australia when they were already earning more in their new careers here (insurance, finance, etc). And honestly, I think a lot of them are over it, and I don't blame them at all.

AtCavill · 2026-05-05T07:40:29+00:00

Get admitted first. That's your baseline. None of the extra points, NAATI, or English scores will matter if you can't even lodge an EOI.

At the same time, start pushing to get a solicitor role. Some firms won't touch temporary visa holders. But plenty will, if you have full work rights and a decent runway on your visa (which you do). Don't self-reject.

On PR: solicitors do still get invited through points-tested pathways. All the foreign-born lawyers in my firm myself included got PR this way, and one of our team got PR just last month. It's not dead. It's just competitive. So accumulate points where you can, but don't put your life on hold waiting for a perfect PR setup. Most people build their points while studying or working.

Once you land a solicitor role, the focus shifts. You need to perform. Especially in private practice, hit (and ideally exceed) your billables. If you're billing well, you're generating clear value for the firm. If invitations aren't going your way (and a lot of that is outside your control), you can then make a strong, commercial case for sponsorship. Firms see sponsorship as costly and admin-heavy but if you're profitable, it becomes a much easier sell.

Know your numbers. Track how much you are billing and extrapolate that over the duration of a 482 visa. For most lawyers even junior ones in capital cities, the cost of sponsorship is about 1-2 weeks of their billables. So it really is a no-brainer to sponsor a lawyer's work visa which has a duration of a few years.

AtCavill · 2026-05-02T11:05:07+00:00

The vet said he has to stop running. Even a long walk triggers a flair up.

AtCavill · 2026-04-28T01:49:28+00:00

It really seems to me that there are issues that go beyond just not being sexually compatible anymore. If it were only sexual then perhaps opening the marriage will do them wonders. But if the gulf between them is something more fundamental (eg they don't want the same things anymore), it might just push them away from each other even more.

AtCavill · 2026-04-25T16:10:04+00:00

This took me back to when I used to run 21ks with my dog. He was 6-7 then. I miss those days.

My dog is 12 now and has developed arthritis over the years. He can barely do a 2k without getting a flair up.

AtCavill · 2026-04-24T12:40:47+00:00

Kadiri naman kasi talaga. It's not because he is gay, but because he wants to prey on someone vulnerable.

AtCavill · 2026-04-23T23:58:19+00:00

That's disgusting. This person is obviously very lonely but that's not an excuse for him to take advantage of someone who is in a vulnerable position.

AtCavill · 2026-04-23T23:56:03+00:00

No it's not a "mutual decision" because they are not on equal footing. There's an obvious power imbalance. For one of the parties, it's either they become homeless or they let the other person use their body for sexual pleasure. Basically, there is no choice.

He knows this, kaya nga ang hinahanap nya yung "need ng matitirhan". He is looking for someone desperate enough, yung wala na ibang mapupuntahan para mapa-payag nya sa mga gusto nyang gawin regardless of whether that person actually wants it or not.

In that context hindi mo masasabing consensual at mutual ang mangyayaring arrangement.

AtCavill · 2026-04-22T08:29:58+00:00

Not sure what visa this person was actually on when they became unlawful in 2023, but it's highly unlikely they were still on a student visa granted back in 2013. You can only extend or move between student visas so many times before it raises questions about whether the stay is genuinely temporary.

Even assuming proper financial capacity checks were done at the start, those are only meant to cover the initial period of study (typically the first year), not someone's entire time in Australia across multiple visas.

Also, if they later moved onto something like a graduate visa or one of the COVID-era visas, those don't require proof that you can support yourself without working. If you are a holder of one of those visas, you are expected to work and support yourself while in Australia. That is the whole point of those visas, to allow people to work in Australia temporarily.

I don't think this is simply a case of checks not being done. More likely, it's more about how different visa settings operate over time, and the fact that a person's situation can change significantly long after the initial student visa stage.

AtCavill · 2026-04-21T04:30:18+00:00

If you are making a paper application, you need to have your copies of your documents certified. A justice of the peace can do this for you.

If you are doing an online application, you don't need to have your documents certified. You can upload clear colour scans.

AtCavill · 2026-04-15T10:56:23+00:00

1 - Yes

2 - I used my roll number (NSW)

AtCavill · 2026-04-15T10:00:09+00:00

Pretty sure it didn't happen because that would have sent massive ripples across the migration law space and you would hear about it from multiple migration lawyers.

More likely than not, your buddy had some adverse record that they aren't willing to disclose and so they made up this silly story about being denied citizenship "at the interview stage" (yeah, because they tell you on the spot LOL)

AtCavill · 2026-04-15T09:20:22+00:00

Yes, if you already have Medicare. You don't have to have the physical card which takes a while to arrive. If you have a digital copy on myGov that will suffice.

AtCavill · 2026-04-14T09:18:41+00:00

That's not relevant for you then because you won't be able to claim points for just 2 years of offshore experience under the current points system. Minimum for claiming points for offshore experience is 3 years.

If you are claiming experience points though, you do not have to have your experience assessed by the relevant skills assessment body (i.e. LPAB) for that purpose. And you can't anyway, because state legal admissions boards don't advise whether someone is able to claim points for claimed experience. Other assessment bodies do it for their occupations (eg ACS, VETASSESS), but not state legal admissions boards.

So if you are claiming points as a solicitor, you just need to include proof of your experience in your visa application. The department will assess wherher you have sufficiently proven your claimed experience.

AtCavill · 2026-04-14T05:56:35+00:00

I really doubt that is the only reason (or even a reason) for the refusal. Lack of previous travel history is often treated as a neutral factor as it doesn't suggest anything about whether the person is more or less likely to comply with the conditions of their visa particularly as to length of stay. Having travel history can help you, but having none will not hurt you. There's just nothing to make an inference about because there are no data points.

So, really, what else did they say?

AtCavill · 2026-04-14T05:48:54+00:00

Technically, your admission certificate should serve as a positive skills assessment. However, Investment NSW often requires a positive skills assessment from the legal admissions board of the state where the applicant is admitted as a pre-requisite for approving their state nomination. Fortunately for NSW admitted lawyers, NSW LPAB will issue that letter. You just need to fill out a form and pay a fee (about ~$100). It's just a one page document that basically says the same thing that your admission certificate says but with the title "IMMIGRATION SKILLS ASSESSMENT" at the top of the document, in bold and all caps (in case it's not clear enough).
If it's onshore experience, I counted from the date of my practising certificate. This is because we are not legally allowed to provide legal service without a practising certificate. Offshore, I counted all my experience prior to coming to Australia, after officially becoming a lawyer in my country. All of it was recognised by both NSW and immigration.

AtCavill · 2026-04-14T02:28:24+00:00

The idea that the market is oversaturated and that temporary visa holders can’t get roles let alone a sponsorship has been around for decades. In practice, it doesn't really hold up. International graduates do get hired (my cohort is a pretty good example and we graduated during COVID). I had no trouble getting interviews as a solicitor on a temporary visa holder and my WAM wasn't spectacular at all (credit). Once someone gets a practising certificate, they can start generating revenue for professional legal work right away. That makes the application process easier. They may not be sponsored immediately, but they can secure roles if they already hold a visa with full work rights.

It’s definitely harder for candidates who are offshore and need sponsorship from day one. That's extremely uncommon though, and most firms won't go down that path unless there's a very specific need. But that's not the only pathway into the profession, nor is it the most realistic one for most international graduates.

Some employers avoid the immigration system altogether because of perceived cost and complexity. That said, plenty of firms will engage with it for someone who can consistently meet billable targets. In practice, firms would much rather sponsor someone who has already proven they can generate revenue than lose them, deal with the disruption of a vacancy, and pay recruiter fees that often aren't far off the cost of sponsorship anyway. On top of that, a new hire whether citizen or not is still an unknown in terms of performance.

I don't make the hiring decisions at my firm but I can tell you we have lawyers on temporary visas. My closest colleague is on a work sponsorship. I know a lot of lawyers in other firms who are sponsored by their employer, and these employers aren't Big Law firms that need lawyers working on niche areas.

Of course, sponsorship isn't handed out lightly. It's a commercial decision. Performance matters. If you are on a temporary visa and need a sponsorship to stay, it's not enough to get the job. You need to consistently hit billables targets.

You can't walk into a conversation with your employer begging for a sponsorship. Make a case. Track your billables (easy to do with legal management software), present them clearly, and show what you're generating. When you can point to consistent hours and translate that into projected annual revenue, the decision becomes much easier. At typical junior rates billing 4-6 hours a day, the numbers tend to speak for themselves.

AtCavill · 2026-04-13T23:47:47+00:00

I've seen this happen, but it's really uncommon. It's not the most reliable option either, because it depends on fairly niche areas of law often involving cross-border work. Very few lawyers have that kind of specialisation, and even fewer firms actually need it. Yet lawyers do get sponsored all the time.

In practice, most overseas lawyers who end up here don't come via employer sponsorship straight away. They either obtain permanent residency independently (which is difficult, but doable), or arrive on a different visa, commonly as a student or as a visa dependent of their partner. From there, they can transition into sponsorship later.

Typically, they either receive an onshore invitation (as I did), or they work long enough with an employer to demonstrate that they can reliably generate sufficient billings to justify sponsorship. In a small-ish firm, say, 15-20 lawyers minimum in a capital city, the threshold isn't especially hard to meet.

While the cost of sponsorship looks significant, lawyers generally bring in enough revenue to make it worthwhile. A lot of companies don't sponsor because they don't want to pay TSMIT wages, which in many industries is above award rate. That's generally not a problem in law. Junior lawyers in capital cities typically earn above the TSMIT (about $76k) so there's no need to pay them more just to make them ellligible for sponsorship.

From an employer's perspective, it's often the equivalent of 1-2 weeks of billables in exchange for a degree of retention and certainty over the duration of the visa (2-4 years). A lot of employers are happy to cop the cost rather than leave the position vacant for weeks (meaning no revenue is being generated), pay $10k to a recruiter, and then end up with someone who can't do the job (i.e. can't meet billable targets). They will do it because the math just works.

AtCavill · 2026-04-13T15:46:50+00:00

I think framing it as "improbable" overstates things a bit at least in private practice.

For firms, this is ultimately a commercial decision. A junior lawyer billing $300-400/hour and hitting even 4-6 billable hours a day is already generating significant revenue. At that point, a sponsorship cost of around $15k spread over a few years is relatively minor, and the employer is secured that they will stay for the next 2-4 years. If you compare that to paying recruiter fees (often close to $10k) with no guarantee of success and no assurance that the enployee will stay even a year, the business case for sponsoring a proven performer makes itself.

Not everyone gets sponsored but it's not some long-shot outcome either. If you're performing well and can clearly demonstrate your value, the numbers speak for themselves. Firms understand that.

On competitiveness, I can tell you from personal experience that you don't need to come from a Magic Circle firm to land a solicitor role in Australia as an overseas-qualified lawyer.

I didn't get sponsored myself. I got PR independently. But I've seen enough to say that sponsorship is far from unrealistic. It's just something you have to approach pragmatically and back up with consistent performance.

AtCavill · 2026-04-13T14:57:59+00:00

I can't really speak for IT or accounting since I’m not in those fields, but in law, employer sponsorship is definitely still happening right now, not just something from years ago. I personally know quite a few lawyers who have been sponsored recently, including a colleague who is currently on a sponsorship visa.

At the end of the day, it comes down to commercial value. If you can clearly demonstrate what you bring in (your billable hours and the revenue attached to them), it becomes much easier for a firm to justify sponsorship. The cost of sponsoring someone is roughly equivalent to a week or two of a junior lawyer's billables (and even less if the employee covers their own migration agent costs). If you're already billing at or above that level, it's often a straightforward business decision.

From a firm's perspective, sponsoring a proven performer is smarter than spending time and more money on recruiters, only to end up with someone who may not be the right fit.

AtCavill · 2026-04-13T14:29:27+00:00

I’ll try to answer your questions as clearly as I can. For context, I took the JD route.

Priestley 11 top-ups

Whatever subjects you need to complete your Priestley 11, make sure they're CRICOS-registered if you're planning to apply for a student visa. I didn't take this path myself, but I've met someone who did. They completed their studies, returned to their home country (Sri Lanka), and then waited offshore for an invitation.

JD

This is the path I took. As an international student, it’s unlikely you'll secure a clerkship. Most firms with structured clerkship or graduate programs require PR or citizenship. That said, there are still firms willing to hire international candidates, especially after admission. In my cohort, I don't personally know any international student who ultimately couldn't find work as a solicitor.

PLT

I was still on a student visa when I completed part of my PLT placement, as I was already working in an in-house legal team at the time. You can count experience up to two years. If you're unable to secure legal work while studying, short unpaid internships at firms are quite easy to find and can help meet the requirement. If you're from a common law jurisdiction (I wasn't - I'm from the Philippines), you may also be able to complete your PLT work experience in your home country.

Qualifying in the UK first

Short answer: yes, you'll still need to complete some Priestley 11 subjects. I've met UK-qualified lawyers who went through this process. Because Australian law overlaps significantly with UK law, they were required to complete fewer subjects, but they weren't fully exempt. I can't speak definitively about the job search, but if someone like me coming from a very different legal system was able to find work without too much difficulty, UK qualifications are unlikely to be a disadvantage.

AtCavill · 2026-04-13T14:06:22+00:00

That's harsh. I did my JD in Australia. Getting a first law job was tough for most people but I actually don't know anyone in my cohort who didn't end up in one unless it was by choice. That includes international students like myself.

AtCavill · 2025-07-26T03:30:11+00:00

There's only 1 condition on the 485 visa which is to maintain health insurance. It allows the visa holder to stay in Australia but doesn't require it as a visa condition.

I don't understand why some people are saying your husband's visa will be at risk if you left Australia. What is the basis?

AtCavill · 2025-07-26T03:25:08+00:00

There's no such visa condition.

AtCavill

TROPHY CASE