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Employer Nomination Scheme (ENS 121)
The Employer Nomination Scheme (ENS) enables Australian employers to nominate highly skilled overseas workers to fill positions that cannot be filled from within the Australian labour market or through the employer's own training programs.
Positions to be filled with an ENS sponsorship must:
- provide working conditions that are no less favourable than provided for under the relevant Australian legislation and awards
- provide remuneration at least equal to the minimum salary specified for the occupation, and
- be full-time and available for a period of at least 3 years (permanent or on-going full time employment is satisfactory).
- be a skilled occupation that is on the Employer Nomination Scheme Occupation List (ENSOL). An employer cannot nominate a position which does not relate to an occupation on the ENSOL. Typically, the common occupations sponsored under ENS are:
- Managers and Administrators;
- Professionals;
- Associate Professionals; and
- Tradespersons and related workers.
ENS consists of 2 distinct stages:
- Nomination by an employer; and
- Migrant’s application for a sponsored visa.
Step 1. Nomination by an Employer.
Employer sponsors must:
- be actively and lawfully operating a business in Australia, ie ABN registered and compliant with local laws
- have a genuine need for a paid employee to fill a position in their business, ie, not “manufactured” to help a friend...
- follow all relevant Australian laws and have a satisfactory record of meeting immigration laws (if applicable)
- have a current training strategy for existing Australian employees, or if a newly established business, have a training plan for future training of Australian employees. (This can include paying a calculated amount into an industry training fund.)
- provide the employee with an offer of permanent employment.
Step 2. Migrant Applies for a Visa
Job applicants must:
- be nominated by an Australian employer to fill a position that meets the nomination requirements;
- be under 45 years of age;
- have vocational English language ability (a score of 5.0 in all four areas of the IELTS test);
- meet health and character requirements; and
- if applying in Australia, be the holder of a qualifying visa.
In addition, applicants must show they have the skills to do the job before they apply for the visa. There are 3 ways to prove this:
- worked full-time in the same occupation for the last 2 years, including at least the last 1 year working for the employer who is nominating them (mostly used for ex-Regional Sponsored visa holders); or
- be nominated to fill a highly paid senior executive position with a salary of more than A$165,000 per annum; or
- have their skills assessed as suitable by the relevant skills assessing authority and, unless exceptional circumstances apply, have at least 3 years experience in the occupation.
In certain circumstances, where a position is so unusual or highly specialised that the employer is unlikely to find anyone who meets the established criteria to fill the vacancy, exceptions to the 3 years experience, age or English language requirements can be made. The visa applicant must include a submission with their visa application which demonstrates the special skills required and/or the difficulties their employer experienced finding a nominee who does meet the experience, age or English language requirements.
If the department accepts that exceptional circumstances exist, a visa can then be granted to a person who does not have at least 3 years relevant post-training employment experience; or is 45 years or older; or has less than vocational English.
If the nominated occupation requires the applicant to hold any kind of license or registration to work in Australia (for example, registered nurse or licensed plumber), they must also be eligible to hold the necessary license or registration before applying under the Australian Employer Nomination Scheme.
It sounds complicated, but in reality it is not. Our candidates are usually already well informed about what what visas they can and cannot obtain.
If you are not comfortable with providing sponsorship for a permanent residence visa, you might like to consider trying the employee out on a 457 Work Permit first. This gives you up to 4 years to look at the new recruit and build a solid employment relationship with them. Once they have shown you what they can do for you, you can sponsor them on an ENS visa for permanent residence at any time within that 4 years.
NB It helps if you make this clear at the time of interview, that you might offer 457 sponsorship until such a time as you wish to offer the ENS sponsorship. You will carry a few more obligations under the 457 (nothing terribly onerous) but these obligations will cease once another visa is obtained. A useful advantage is that a 457 can usually be secured much faster than an ENS visa, hence many employers approach of securing the worker earlier on a 457 while the ENS application is still being processed.
It’s worth some thought. Hiring a migrant and sponsoring them can do wonders for your business productivity, especially where the migrant gains Permanent Residence through work. There are many employers who cannot access this large pool of talent simply because they will not sponsor a potential employee. Sponsorship requires a little time and effort, but it is not onerous, expensive or difficult.
Migrants will be deeply appreciative of the start they could be given by you, and are highly unlikely to jeopardise their employment as their costs have been quite high already.
They will typically have invested significant sums of money and waited nearly two years for the Australian Government to allow them to migrate to Australia. They will have invested around $40,000 as a married couple along the way, paying out for visa charges, medical tests, language tests, a skills assessment, airfare and household relocation costs. The last thing they want is to arrive in Australia and be without work.
Add in the emotional upheaval of leaving family, friends and a known career path, plus having to deal with an immigration system that is in a constant state of change, and all this should indicate to you that migrants make a serious financial and emotional commitment in order to enjoy the Australian lifestyle.
The question for you as an employer is: “How do I recruit a motivated migrant and encourage them to stay?”
It helps to understand the visa structure and see the requirements as being beneficial to both parties. In your case as an employer, when negotiating employment terms with potential migrant candidates, be aware that your official sponsorship is required when making an offer of employment, and the visa carries the goal of Permanent Residence for the migrant. In exchange for obtaining these benefits, the successful applicant is more likely to reward you with diligence and hard work that is hard to find amongst Generation Y.
How do you find these great future employees?
Hire A Migrant is a free service for employers looking to fill job vacancies. Click here to send email with basic details of your vacant positions. We will then check our list of candidates for consideration and forward them to you for free. If our list comes up short, we will contact you to enquire if you wish us to market your vacancies overseas in your preferred countries of origin, again at no charge to yourself.
If you need assistance with putting together your sponsorship for DIAC approval, look at our list of recommended migration agents, or find your own consultant here. NB Make sure whoever you deal with as a migration agent in Australia is a Registered Migration Agent with the Office of MARA.
The above information is largely taken verbatim from DIAC web site.
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