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Mary Heath
Registered Migration Agent 0005790
MIA

Trade skills in Australia – a specialty at Hello Australia

On this page:

The Skilled Migration Program visas for Australia (permanent visas for migration) are granted to people who have qualifications or can otherwise prove that they have a skill to earn a living in this country. The Skilled Occupations List, the SOL, lists the occupations that are needed in Australia. If your skill is not listed, then you cannot apply for a Skilled Migration Visa. You must ‘nominate’ for a skill on the SOL. The SOL does not list every occupation – farmers are not listed, nor are photographers or actors. SOL not only lists the occupations that Australia needs more of. It also allocates points according to the demand here.The fine art of furniture polishing and finishing at Ostrick Furniture, Perth.

By far the largest section in the SOL is devoted to trade skills. These are skills we most need, and in many employment markets the need is urgent. This has happened because our school leavers are encouraged to enter university, and many take IT training, or business and commerce, or accounting. They would prefer to work in an office. We have ‘qualification inflation’ with too many young people trained in desk jobs and not enough coming forward to take up the trade skills. There is a desperate situation in many trades like metal fabricator, air-conditioning and refrigeration mechanic, plumbing, automotive mechanic, hairdresser, upholsterer and automotive electrician.

 

 

Trades Recognition Australia – TRA

Trades Recognition Australia is the authority that assesses trade qualifications and work experience for migrants, to make sure that those coming into this country are properly trained and experienced. TRA assesses against equivalent training in Australia for the same job description.

TRA assesses by examining documents, photographs, design drawings, Statutory Declarations and Deeds of Apprenticeship.  It is an assessment of paper-provided proof of skills.

 

 

Overseas apprenticeships, traineeships and trade school diplomas

Apprenticeships and traineeships are recognised in Australia, and well-respected. If you had apprentice training, don’t think your recent work experience is going to be more important to TRA. For many trades, a formal apprenticeship under an Apprentice Master is of greater value than time at college.  We really value the skills taught from master to student. College training and a formal apprenticeship registered in the overseas country can be checked against the overseas records for comparison with training in the same trade in Australia.

A formal overseas apprenticeship, with a Deed or Contract of Apprenticeship, should be four years long, and there is an additional three years required in work experience before you are eligible to apply for skills assessment.

If you have an informal apprenticeship, or a vocational traineeship that was not arranged through your government, it should be five years long, plus three years of work experience before you apply for skills assessment.

Both formal and informal training must be verified with a document from your trainers, giving the number of years you trained, the tools you learned to use and the skills taught to you. You should send your award certificate from trade school, and your transcript of marks for your individual courses. For TRA, these need to be photocopied and certified by a suitable authority (a Justice of the Peace, a Notary Public, a senior Post Office officer, etc).

If the original documents are lost or  not available, you will need to provide evidence from other sources. New college award certificates can be applied for by writing to your college,  or you can ask for a letter from the trade school, on headed notepaper and signed by the Principal, to state that they do not provide transcripts. You will need good evidence of your training.

 

 

Work Experience only

As of 1st September 2007, work experience alone is not sufficient evidence of trade skill training for a
Trades Recognition Australia application. 

 

 

Requirements of a qualified tradesperson

 

Work experience records

As well as proof of qualification for the job, you will need to demonstrate work experience by providing references from your employers and some pay slips. Your employer should:

Hello Australia advises clients to write a work reference, including all the details required, and suggests to employers that this is what TRA needs. Then our clients send the text through to their employer electronically for including in the work reference. Otherwise employers can have difficulty remembering.

If you have served in the Armed Forces, then provide evidence of trade training undertaken during service. For example, your training and employment record (if applicable) and evidence of the nature and content of the training, including details of the duration, date of completion and subjects covered, describing the content of each subject studied, and the machines, tools and equipment on which you were trained. This is regarded as good training in Australia, but needs to be properly documented.

 

 

Australian Qualifications

You can attend Tertiary and Further Education college (TAFE) on a Student Visa, and use the 20 hours work a week permitted on this visa to gain experience in the trade. You will need a total of 900 hours in work experience to qualify for the practical side of your training, and since all students applying for an Onshore Skilled Migration Visa require two academic years study in Australia, this is possible. Students who hope to apply for TRA assessments of their trade training in Australia must work in the trade of their training. For example, a chef must work in a kitchen, and a carpenter must work in a woodworking and cabinet-making business. It will not be accepted if the chef has work experience waiting at tables, or the carpenter has 900 hours working as an assistant gardener.

Not all occupations are offered for trade training in Australia. You need to check at the college where you are training,
or at Central TAFE offices in the State where you will study.

 

Required Australian qualification: AQF III Diploma.

With this qualification, and 900 hours work experience, an overseas student can apply to TRA for assessment, and if given a positive assessment, they can also apply for an Onshore Skilled Migration Visa. No further work experience is required.

 

 

The Department of Immigration and Citizenship  (DIAC) application

DIAC requires the original TRA assessment (not a certified copy), or a scanned-in copy, depending how you are sending in your visa application.  DIAC may require the documents supplied to TRA as proof of trade skills. These can be certified copies. Because of this requirement, we advise our clients to prepare two sets of certified copies of all their Awards, Diplomas, transcripts of marks and work experience documents — one for TRA and the other for DIAC..

 

 

Self-employed tradespeople

If you own your own company, or are self-employed, you must supply the following extra documents. These are in addition to your qualification documents, the fee payment, your identity proofs of passport and birth certificate, and two passport photographs.

  1. Supply evidence in the form of work references to cover your employed periods, and evidence of time in the Armed Forces, as above.
  2. A personal statement on a properly signed statutory declaration, affidavit, sworn statement or similar legal declaration (with your signature witnessed by a legal authority in your country), providing full details on: the exact commencement and completion date of each period of self employment;  the occupations in which you were/are self employed.;  the nature and content of the work tasks you personally performed (rather than supervised others, r employed others to do);  the number of staff employed and their occupations.
  3. Your workshop and the tools and equipment you used. In addition, you can supply photographs, verified by your Accountant or a supplier, who must identify himself/herself with a business card.
  4. Your business registration certificate covering each period of self employment (if appropriate in your country).
  5. A statement on letterhead from your accountant or legal representative ,certifying the name and nature of your business, the exact dates of self-employment and the capacity in which you  have been self employed – eg self employed bricklayer, or roof tiler.
  6. At least three statements from suppliers, on letterhead  (if applicable) confirming the nature of your business, dates of trading periods, the total amount of all material/equipment purchased over a 12 month period and the types of all material/equipment supplied.
  7. At least three statements from clients, on letterhead paper (if applicable), confirming full details    of the work you did for them and the dates, including the total amount of contracts executed over a 12 month period.  You can include photos of the finished work, signed off by the client on the back.
  8. Evidence of any current trade licensing or registration and the information about the registration requirements. These can often be downloaded and printed from the registration authority’s website.
  9. Advertising material used by your company to promote the products, including websites and other advertising. Get an authorised person who knows you to sign off on these, that they are genuine advertising used by your company. Your accountant would be a good authority, or a supplier.

Statements and Affidavits must be signed by an authorised person, capable of making the statement. They must give their full name under the signature, also their position, and contact details in case TRA or DIAC wishes to contact them for verification of your skills.

 

 

Preparing applications to TRA

Whatever type of application you are preparing for TRA, make sure you have as much ‘third-party’ evidence as possible. If you are supplying photographs of your work, get your employer to sign on the back, giving brief information about who he/she is and the date. If you are self-employed, supply full documentation about your business, as listed above. You should also send in photographs of your workshop, factory, restaurant or hairdressing salon. Photographs of your business premises can be signed on the back by the owner of the neighbouring firm to verify that you are indeed self-employed and this is your business. The person providing confirmation should also identify who they are by giving contact details, and the sign and date it. Or an accountant or solicitor who knows you can confirm that that these are a photographic record of your business premises.

Printed pay-slips are confirmation of employment. Superannuation certificates are proof of employment. Some of this type of confirmation should be supplied with employer references.

Those workers who are without qualifications will need a full and detailed history of their work experience, and of their skills, duties, and the equipment they use, in the form of a Statutory Declaration or an Affidavit, witnessed by an authorised person. If there are gaps in the career history you supply, you should prepare a Statutory Declaration or Affidavit to cover the missing years, stating where you worked, why you cannot obtain a work experience reference, the name of your job, the duties you performed and the equipment used. An Affidavit or Statutory Declaration is a legal and formal document with your signature witnessed by an authorised person. If you are not sure about this, consult a solicitor in your own country.

 

Translation of documents

All documents submitted in support of your TRA assessment must be in English. If you are submitting documents not in English, you must send a certified copy of the original, plus a certified copy of the translation by an accredited translation service. The translation must be stamped on each page by the translation service, and be accompanied by information about the translation organisation.

 

Application Forms are available from TRA at:

TRA Application Form in PDF format

TRA Assessment Fees:

Standard application, AUD$300

Hello Australia Immigration Services provides a full service of skills assessment application to TRA. Trade skills are a specialty in our company. We firstly assess your chances of success with TRA by asking you to supply full details of your training or qualifications (on our questionnaire). If we think you have a good chance of success, we supply forms and instructions for your application. Once we have received all the documentation we need, we send in the application and monitor it during processing at TRA. If there is a problem, or the application gets lost at the assessor, we keep full copies of the application to supply support to TRA. In due course, we advise you of the decision on your application.

Fees to Hello Australia depend on your skill and how easy it will be to gather the correct documentation. Usually we charge AUD$1300 to AUD$1900, and this is often included with other charges for a Skilled Migration Visa. We can handle the whole two-stage visa application, and apply for State or family sponsorship if required.

Please contact us at:

Hello Australia Immigration Services Pty Ltd
Level 5, 326 Hay St, Perth, Western Australia.
Telephone: 61 8 9325 7111  Fax: 61 8 9325 4004

 

VETASSESS Competency Demonstration Testing Service

Carpentry and cabinetry workshop, Perth.From 2007, some of the trade skills in selected overseas countries are assessed by VETASSESS. This is initially by paper application, and the second part is a trade skills competency demonstration in the country where the applicant lives. Trained assessors from TAFE colleges in Australia visit special workshops, and test over a couple of days in all the competencies expected of a skilled worker, using the type of tools and equipment a migrant could expect to use in their new job in Australia.

See our VETASSESS page for more information.

 

Visit the VETASSESS website about their new service
for trade skilled people:
http://www.vetassess.com.au