Sponsor Legal Obligations (482 visa)
Bribes for Sponsors
It is illegal to receive a benefit as a ‘bribe’ to sponsor someone for a visa. Details are here: http://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/Busi/Empl/Empl/employing-legal-workers
Sponsors and visa applicants are required to certify they have not been involved in that. Details are available here: http://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/Trav/Work/Work-1/payment-for-visas-certification-requirement
Sponsor Obligations
We recommend that you put procedures in place to ensure the company meets all its sponsor obligations. Failing to meet all the obligations can have very serious consequences, including black bans, cancellation of the sponsorship and the loss of all 457/482 visa holders.
We summarize the obligations below.
These obligations are most commonly breached:
- Wrong/changed job – ensure visa holders continue to do the job described to Immigration (if you need to change their work duties, contact us first to discuss)
- Associated Entities – visa holders can only work for their sponsor or an ‘associated entity’ under the Corporations Law. If you want to transfer a visa holder to another business in your group, please check with us first.
- Notify changes – tell Immigration within 28 days when certain events occur (tell us and we will notify Immigration on your behalf)
- 457/482 holder ceases work
- Your business experiences a significant change (change of address or contact details, new director/partner appointed, a bankruptcy/liquidation process begins, etc)
Other Obligations:
- cooperate with inspectors (if you are visited)
- ensure that 457/482 visa holders get equivalent terms and conditions of employment (as equivalent Aussies)
- keep records (anything relevant to these obligations, your sponsorship and 457/482 visa holders)
- provide records and information to the Minister (if requested)
- not recover from, transfer or charge certain costs to another person (costs of sponsorship, nomination & recruitment)
- pay travel costs to enable sponsored people to leave Australia (if required)
- pay costs to remove unlawful non-citizens (if required)
- do not engage in discriminatory recruitment practices
The details are available here:
The ‘Strengthening Employer Compliance Act’ commenced on 1 July 2024. This legislation is intended to ‘improve employer compliance and protect temporary migrant workers from exploitation’.
New laws include
- It is now a crime to coerce or unduly pressure a person into breaching their work-related visa conditions
- employers convicted of such offences can be temporarily banned from hiring temporary visa holders
- The names of such employers can be published on the Home Affairs website
- Fines have been increased
- More powers for Australia Border Force officers
- Work exploitation will be taken into account in visa cancellation proceedings
New tough penalties,
- Civil penalty up to $79,200
- Criminal penalties include imprisonment for up to 2 years, or a fine up to $118,800
More information is available here: https://immi.homeaffairs.gov.au/visas/employing-and-sponsoring-someone/migrant-worker-protections
Help
We are happy to help you develop/implement systems to cover all these obligations. Let us know if you want our help.
