VisaFirst.com - good/bad?

Rabies

I'm thinking about heading to NZ on a working holiday. Someone pointed me towards VisaFirst.com, has anyone got any experiences with them? What other companies are out there.

Would prefer to pay someone to sort it all out for me. Less hassel.

Saintly

Three of us are currently in Oz, we all used Visa First and we all vowed to never do so again! This is my own personal experience - their customer service is appalling. Some of the agents have poor English speaking skills so that when problems arose (as in the case of 2 of our applications), it was acutally difficult at times to communicate with them. I am a healthcare worker - they sent me out the wrong forms, delaying the process by two weeks - if I hadn't noticed, I would have paid out 400 euro as opposed to the 50 euro for my healthcheck. I had to call them every day for three weeks, getting the same vague response every day. They contradicted each other, there was absolutely no communication between them. Finally, I called the Oz Consultate in London and Tasmania. Got my visa 2 days later, three days before I was due to fly out. They also plug their other services and charge a ridiculous amount for them - setting up a bank account, organising a mobile phone, getting your tax no. None of this stuff is complicated - we have still had to chase them to get our tax no. Basically, I took the easy option with Visa First and it turned out to be an absolute nightmare! Based on my own experience, I couldn't recommend them.

Saintly

Skittlebrau

I had the opposite experience when I used them for my Oz visa. It all went very smoothly, no problems at all. I availed of some of their extras too like the bank account and the tax file number. Being able to transfer money easily to the bank account before I arrived was a big plus. Yes they charge extra for these services and you can save money if you do it yourself but I was looking for convenience and in that sense it was worth it.

ShiverinEskimo

What Skittlebrau said.

Rabies

Prob give them a call. After the weekend. Need to check up on flights and everything else.

Do I need to have my flights before I apply for the visa?

ShiverinEskimo

Nope but you need to know the date you'll be touching down in Australia/NZ. So if you haven't booked the flight when you apply for the visa be sure of the date. In that respect it might be better to book the flights first in case you can't get a flight later for the date you provided.

Skittlebrau

Yeah I'd reccommend booking the flights first. The visa only takes 48 hours to come through anyway so you can have it all sorted in less than a week.

Rabies

Hmm.. The Irish number doesn't seem to be working.
Is the office in Dublin still open?

iamstop

Just want to bump this thread to see did anyone else have a more recent experience with them, good or bad. I'm thinking of getting on their job finder service.