In the 18th October invitation round, 1250 invitations were issued bringing the October total to 2500 invitations. If you have a keen eye, you may have noticed that the 4th October round had only 1000 invitations for subclass 189 visas, leaving 250 invitations in the abyss.
In actual fact, the system experienced a glitch that saw a manual round deliver an extra 250 invitations – mainly to Accountants . This brings the number of invitations for the year so far to a neat 10,000.
Similarly to previous rounds, only applicants with a points score of 65 or above received invitations however, applicants for the 489 stream required a minimum of 70 points. It appears as though the Department is beginning to limit the number of invitations for this stream, with only 5 being delivered.
The good news is that Accountants require only 75 points, down from 85 in previous rounds. However this occupation, along with Auditors, some Engineering occupations and ICT Business and Systems Analysts are still subject to pro-rata arrangements due to their high demand. We can expect the points score to remain high for these occupations as the Department works through the large number of applicants.
The next round is scheduled for the 22nd November, with a maximum of 700 invitations for subclass 189 visas to be issued (this was also the number for the 9th November round) and just 5 invitations for the 489 stream.
Please contact our experienced Skilled Migration team if you want advice on your options or if you are looking at lodging an Expression of Interest (EOI) in the near future. With so few invitations available, it will be important to not waste an invitation and ensure that the EOI is correct.
