Update 2018: the Australian Department of Home Affairs is re-doing their website (as of July).   Because this page describes what is soon to be the old website, I have stopped linking to it from within my site.

If you got here from a search engine, I recommend these updated and accurate pages instead:

• Australian Partner Visa Online Application Tips
• Our Australian Partner Visa Evidence
• Our Australian Partner Visa Application Timeline
• How to Avoid the Credit Card Surchage When Paying for the Visa

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Historical page:

As you know from reading my Australian Partner Visa Online Application Tips, there are some key things I wish we’d known before paying the cost of our Australian DeFacto Partner Visa.  Not knowing the Australian immigration department’s organizational structure while we prepared our visa wasted a ton of our time.  I can only assume this is the case for most applicants.  Here’s why:

You don’t get to find out anything about the immigration department’s system until you’ve paid the Australian Partner Visa Fee.  And you can’t pay the fee until you’ve answered the pre-payment questions, some of which require you to summarize and give some details about the evidence you’ll be submitting.  It’s difficult to summarize your evidence until you’ve gathered it all together.  And it’s difficult to gather it all together without having some sort of system to organize everything.  (Our evidence totaled over 160 pages!)

So you spend weeks or months getting organized, pay the fee, and then have to spend days or weeks getting reorganized!

To save you from that, here is an explanation of what we saw after we paid the fee and finally had access to the upload screen.

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How the Australian Partner Visa Online dashboard is laid out:

Once you pay and reveal the upload screen, you see that it’s divided into sections. The two major sections are Person 1 (applicant) and Person 2 (sponsor). Each person has two smaller sections a “Next Steps” area and an “Attachments Provided” area.

To get all your evidence into the system, you either follow the prompts (listed below under the “Next Steps” heading) to upload certain types of evidence, or you click an attachment button and fill out a submission form about what you’re attaching.

Before I get into the confusing details of exactly what’s in the two online submission areas (“Next Steps” and “Attachments Provided”), here are a few helpful things to know:

First I’ll describe what you see on your dashboard once you’ve paid. Then I’ll talk about the department’s dozens of possible labels for your evidence/document types.

“Next Steps”
– Sub-Section on your Australian Partner Visa Online dashboard

As indicated previously, your dashboard is divided into two major sections – Person 1 (applicant) and Person 2 (sponsor). Each person has two subsections – Next Steps and Attachments Provided.

The “Next Steps” area seems to contain upload prompts for some of the most critical items, but also upload prompts for things that may not apply to you. ¹I wish I could offer perfect clarity here, but it only dawned on me to take note of the process for the benefit of others five months after we’d applied.

Next Steps is a record of what prompts you’ve replied to and which you haven’t, but it isn’t a comprehensive checklist of everything needed to be uploaded for your specific Australian Partner Visa situation.

What You’ll See: Next Steps Upload Prompts

Here are the “Evidence Types” you’ll be prompted to upload in the Next Steps area for the applicant:

• Address — Residental, Evidence of
• Birth or Age, Evidence of
• Character, Evidence of
• Citizenship — Not Australian, Evidence of
• Identity, Evidence of
• Photograph
• Relationship — Spouse, De facto Partner, Evidence of
• Travel Document
• Contact while apart, Evidence of
• Couple are living together, Evidence of
• Financial aspects of the relationship, Evidence of
• Form 888 Statutory declaration by a supporting witness in relation to a Partner or Prospective Marriage visa application
• Length of the de facto relationship, Evidence of
• Nature of the couple’s household, Evidence of
• Nature of the couple’s mutual commitment to each other, Evidence of
• Social aspects of the relationship, Evidence of

The following prompts also appear, but didn’t apply to our situation:

• Change of Name, Evidence of
• Family Composition, Evidence of
• Form 956 Appointment of a migration agent
• Form 1221 Additional personal particulars form
• Health, Evidence of
• Medical Examination, Evidence of Intention to Undergo ²We didn’t upload anything here because there was a statement below this section stating “health has been finalised for this person for this visa subclass”¦” my health requirements were complete. We foolishly got my exam when it was convenient and cheap — long before applying. We were very, very lucky that the visa was approved less than a month before the exams would have expired.
• Military Discharge, Evidence of
• Military Service, Evidence of
• National Identity Document (other than Passport)
• Photograph — Other
• Divorce/Separation, Evidence of
• Form 956A Appointment of an authorised contact
• Form 80 Personal particulars for character assessment
• Marriage, Evidence of
• Registered relationship, Evidence of
• Visa status in country of residence, Evidence of

Here are the “Evidence Types” you’ll be prompted to upload in the Next Steps area for the sponsor:

• Address — Residental, Evidence of — Utilities Account
• Birth or Age, Evidence of — Birth Certificate
• Citizenship — Australian, Evidence of — Passport
• Identity, Evidence of — Birth Certificate ³As you can see, we uploaded his birth certificated multiple times for different Evidence Types

The following prompts also appear, but didn’t apply to our situation:

• Australian Permanent Residence, Evidence of
• Change of Name, Evidence of
• Character, Evidence of
• Eligible New Zealand Citizen, Evidence of
• Family Composition, Evidence of
• Divorce/Separation, Evidence of
• Form 40SP Sponsorship for a partner to migrate to Australia

What You’ll See – Next Steps Headings

The “Next Steps” sub-section headings are Type, Date, Progress, and Action.

• “Type” – displays just the Evidence Type until you’ve uploaded your document, then it adds Document Type to the displayed text. (See Fig.1)
• “Date” – the date you uploaded the document.
• “Progress” – states “Recommended” (when you haven’t uploaded) or “Received” (when you have uploaded) (see Fig.1)
• “Action” – a link allowing you to attach a document. Clicking on the link brings you to the attachment submission form with the Evidence Type already filled in. Then you choose the document type from a drop down list and enter a file description before attaching your file.

“Attachments Provided”
– Sub-Section in Your Australian Partner Visa Dashboard

Let’s recap: your dashboard is divided into two major sections – Person 1 (applicant) and Person 2 (sponsor). Each person has two subsections – Next Steps and Attachments Provided.

Attachments Provided is really just a record of what you’ve submitted, albeit more detailed.

This area was probably blank when we started, and filled itself in as we uploaded documents.

What You’ll See – Attachments Provided Headings

The Attachments Provided headings are Evidence Type, Document Type, Description, Date Received, and Filename. As you can see, there is some overlap with the Next Steps section.

• Evidence Type — This is whatever you selected from the preset, dropdown list when you uploaded the piece of evidence.
• Document Type – This is also whatever you selected from the preset, dropdown list when you uploaded the piece of evidence. ⁴Do you see how it would be nice to have these labels at the outset when you’re organizing everything?
• Description — this is a line of text you write to describe to your case officer what the file contains. This was key for us, as we often submitted an “Evidence Type” pdf that contained several “Document Types” and used the description to show that it contained, for example, emails, a payslip, a stat dec, and bank statements ⁵in this specific example, we were proving the length of our relationship
• Date Received — the date you uploaded the document
• Filename — whatever you named the file. We worked hard to be very clear with our file names. Again, I’m sure it helps to have your pdfs named things like “Social Aspects of Relationship, joint travel” vs. “amybrian europe” ⁶See? Another reason that it would be great to have the Evidence Type and Document Type labels from the outset.

Australian Partner Visa Document & Evidence Type Dropdown Lists

Now you know about the sections where you upload and track your evidence progress. But what about the actual labels for your Australian Partner Visa Application evidence? You know… the labels that you have to apply to every single piece of evidence you upload? The labels that would have been super handy and saved us tons of time?

When you attach a PDF of your evidence, you will be asked to complete the following drop downs:

• who it’s for (applicant or sponsor)
• what type of evidence it is – e.g. proof of identity ⁷if you’ve arrived at the attachment screen via “Next Steps,” this part is pre-filled for you depending on which prompt you clicked
• what type of document it is – e.g. bank statement, passport, etc.
• how you’d like to describe the file ⁸this is a fill-in, not a drop down
• button to select the file to upload from your computer

Knowing which labels existed would have helped us predict the best way to organize our information. This would have saved us a ton of time, because you basically have to organize your information before you pay. But they don’t let you see the labels until after you pay. Sad basket. That, my friends, is the entire reason I created this webpage. So no one else has to go through that!

Here are the labels.

Keep in mind that the labels seem to be for all types of immigration visas, so lots of them will likely not apply to you. There there are over 270 different options to select under Document Type, and it’s hard to see how many of them would ever be needed for a partner visa. But hopefully the label lists will give you clues so that you only have to organize your Australian Partner Visa evidence once (instead of twice, like us!).

Before awesome reader, Campbell ⁹who is working on his Chinese wife’s visa typed everything up for you, all I had to offer were these Evidence Type Screenshots and Document Type Screenshots. Thank you, Campbell, from everyone who reads this page!

Good Luck!

That’s it! Hope that helps clear up some of the confusion about how to organize yourself as you go about preparing for the crazy Australian Partner Visa Application process!

You can read about how to look at our evidence here.
There’s also a way to avoid a payment fee when you pay the visa cost.
Don’t miss these application tips.
Here’s our application timeline.

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Whoa. I can’t believe all this is free.
Can I buy you a drink?

Ha! Sure.
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I’ll take an oaked bourbon on the rocks.
Or a Penfold’s Koonunga Hill Shiraz Cab.
Or a prickly pear margarita.
Or a flat white.
Or water. I drink a lot of water.
Or my favorite super-legit hangover pills.

Hey Bartender! Get the lady a”¦

Oaked Bourbon $10.00 USDPenfold’s Koonunga Hill $8.00 USDPrickly Pear Margarita $9.00 USDFlat White $5.00 USDWater $2.00 USDBottle of Legit Hangover Pills $19.00 USD

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