Glenn Andert’s blog

My experience immigrating into New Zealand has been delightful, so far.

Shortly after arrival in Wellington in February, I talked to a number of private immigration consultants. Steve McNulty at Migrate New Zealand was extraordinarily helpful. He spent close to an hour giving me great advice, suggested that I should do the process myself, and would not take a fee for his time. Should you ever need an immigration consultant, Steve is my recommendation.

New Zealand Immigration Service (NZIS) has been quite helpful and friendly all along the way – not what I expect from a government organization (based on my experience in the USA). My first happy encounter resulted in my visitor permit being extended into 2009. Wow – that was more than I expected. My second happy encounter occurred just recently — NZIS informed me that they have selected my “Expression of Interest” (EOI) from the applicant pool. Yahoo!!! (Or, should that be Google?). Next, they will assign an officer to my case, and review my EOI to make sure that my claims are credible, which they are. Then they will send me an “Invitation to Apply”. At that point, I submit my actual application for residency, and a bunch of supporting documents. The cool thing is that I have already supplied all that stuff – medical exam, FBI report, financial, education, work history, etc, and its all good. So I am hoping for smooth sailing from this point forward in the process! Very very cool! It takes a while for the wheels to turn, I’m told. So we should breath while we are waiting 🙂