Is your migration agent safe to deal with? Are they fake? Fly-by-nighters? Scammers? Or are they honest and ethical, like all Registered Migration Agents should be?

Is your migration agent a legitimate migration agent?

It’s a perfectly reasonable question to ask. This is Philippines after all, and you hear sound warnings about watching out for scams and scam artists all the time. There are certainly plenty of con artists around, and you are well advised to pay heed to advice to be careful. The Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIBP) makes it clear that if you get help with your visa application you are strongly advised to use a Registered Migration Agent (RMA) for your own safety. And getting a partner visa from Philippines to Australia is something that obviously matters a great deal to you.

And yes, Jeff Harvie from Down Under Visa is a Registered Migration Agent, and will remain so. We’re here for the long term.

How can you be sure an agent is legitimate?

Very easy. The Australian Government has long looked out for the needs of Australians by making it law in Australia that only registered and qualified people may give migration advice. Through the Department (DIBP) they run the office of MARA (Migration Agents Registration Authority) to manage the profession and to maintain standards. My own registration with MARA is my “license” to practice. If an RMA decided to do the wrong thing by someone and to take their money without delivering, they risk losing their registration. I for one am not going to watch the doors of my business close for good for the sake of a few dollars, rest assured.

So how would you check up on an RMA? I’ll give you a few ideas:

Look on Google

Look up “[their name] scam” or “[their business name] scam” or “[their business name] review” on Google and see what you find. Do that with Down Under Visa and you find mostly links to BLOG articles by me warning about scams both migration and non-migration. Not a bad word at all. You can even try Facebook. Again, nothing.

Do they have a testimonials page?

Down Under Visa have a large number of video testimonials from happy clients over the years. Have a look. It’s very obvious that none of ours are scripted or done with actors. Just ordinary people like yourselves. Some clients ask if they can be video’d in our office, and others make them at home on their phones and send them in. There are some nice stories in there. Please have a look HERE.

Contact MARA

Yes, you can always contact MARA. Look at their website at www.mara.gov.au and look up their MARN (registration number). Mine is 0959797. You can see my registration is there and current, which it wouldn’t be if I wasn’t legitimate or if I was running an unethical practice. Look at the sanctions section and see if the RMA’s name comes up at all. Impossible to hide these things.

Travel Agents and Unregistered “Agents”

Try all the same things above with travel agency in the nearest town in the Philippines. See if they have a website full of positive stories from satisfied clients with visas. See if they have MARA registration.

And see if they assess you before taking you on, or if they will take all who apply regardless of whether they qualify for a visa or not? Will they say YES to whatever you ask of them? Down Under Visa say NO every single day, and we say “I don’t want to waste your time or your money”. We have plenty to do as it is without having to take on hopeless cases and give ourselves a bad reputation. We enjoy being able to hold our heads up high, knowing that we take excellent care of our clients without being “yes men”. Make sure you accept nothing less.

Further Reading

Australian visa applications and dodgy schemes

Down Under Visa set high standards in visa applications

Why Jeff Harvie and Down Under Visa do what we do