Last updated on August 20th, 2020
Completing two major tasks – passing IELTS and getting a successful skill evaluation from ACS – was an incredible boost for my confidence. With a renewed enthusiasm, I started working on the next step – submit an Expression of Interest or EOI.
What Is Expression of Interest or EOI?
EOI is a way to show that you are interested to apply for the skilled visa to migrate to Australia. Filing an EOI is the first step towards the Australian skilled visa. It is an online application in which you have to mention all your personal details, education and work history, dependent information and the visa that you are interested to apply for.
Once you file an EOI, your application goes into a pool of applications which is available for any state, region or employer to look at. If found suitable, they can sponsor you, provided that you chose a sponsored visa.
How To Submit An EOI?
To submit an EOI, you need to create an account on SkillSelect website. After you fill in the basic details and create your account, you can start working on your EOI application. You need your passport, skills assessment and IELTS results as well as all your education and work-related details to start working on EOI.
One thing I particularly liked about SkillSelect is that it is designed in a wizard-like manner. So you don’t have to fill in all the details at once. You can save your details one screen at a time and visit later to continue adding information to your EOI. This is really handy as you need to fill in a lot of information which may not always be available at one go.
Submitting an EOI is free and you can select multiple visa types to increase your chances to get invited. For example, you may indicate your preference for state-sponsored as well as regional visa, increasing your odds of getting picked by either of them.
Another important thing about EOI is that points are calculated on “as of today” basis.
It means that even though you submitted an EOI with 60 points, your points at the time of invite might go up or down. For example, at the time of filing EOI, your age is 32 giving you 30 points for age. But let’s say you turn 33 next month, in that case, your new points total will go down by 5 points due to age. Similarly, the increase in experience may add more points. So you need to be careful about these edge cases when submitting an EOI.
Getting Passport For My Daughter
I submitted my EOI for the skilled independent visa on 14 July 2014, just a couple of days after my birthday, though I was too busy to celebrate. A lot of things were going on behind the scenes apart from EOI, the first and foremost being getting a passport for my daughter.
When it became clear to me that I was eligible for invites based on ACS skills assessment and IELTS score, things started moving quickly for me. I wanted to be ready with all the documents to lodge the application if and when I receive the invite.
I booked an appointment at PSK Pune for 25th July. Thankfully, I had mine and my wife’s passport renewed a couple of months back. Why didn’t we go for our daughter’s passport back then? simply due to one condition. To get the passport for a kid, both parents must update their passports with their spouse’s name. As we still had old passports at that time, getting a passport for our daughter was not an option. So we decided to first update our passports to have that information and then proceed to get daughter’s passport.
Surprisingly, PSK Pune is much improved compared to the old passport office. In the old passport office, there was a single queue for everyone. As an added flavour, you will be treated as if they were paying you to work for them.
Thankfully, PSK was different. To be honest, PSK is such a shame for a typical government office, probably because it is managed by TCS staff. Such an efficiency, so much cleanliness and light and no bribery, are you kidding me?
We quickly got our daughter’s documents pre-scanned by the staff, a token was generated and almost instantly we were called to finish the formalities. Thanks to the less chaotic atmosphere, my daughter was in a good mood and gave a bewildered expression for the photo. She might be the youngest passport holder in all generations of our family and soon to be the youngest international traveller too!
The Great Indian Police Verification Drama
Though my daughter didn’t have to go through the police verification, it was not the case with my wife and me. Earlier, when I received the passport without any police verification, I was overjoyed thinking that since it was just a renewal, police verification was eliminated. Soon I knew how wrong I was.
One day while finishing my work, I got a call from the local police station asking me to come down the next day at 9 AM along with all the documents for verification. Unfortunately, me being in a hurry to catch my bus, heard it wrong. Next day, I went there at 10 AM instead of 9 AM. I explained my situation but couldn’t get an appointment on that day as the officer in charge had left already. I was told to wait for another call for an appointment, which never came.
After a few days, I again visited the police station and the guy there told me to get a fresh police verification request initiated from the Passport office.
Damn! That means I will have to spend a whole day in the queue just to initiate the request. By the way, this is done at the old passport office which means even longer queue and wait time! I cursed myself for not listening to that call properly, but what’s done cannot be undone.
The very next day, I went to the old passport office at Senapati Bapat Road early in the morning and joined the queue so long that someone might have thought there is some crazy sale offer going on inside. After hours of sun-baked, sweaty “fun” time, when I finally reached the counter, the lady at the counter gave me the pleasant news that the counter time was up and I would have to come next day.
Thanks mate! What a wonderful way to waste someone’s time?
Next day after repeating the same exercise, I finally successfully submitted the request for police verification. In the meantime, my wife had her police verification done at the same police station. She requested the police officer to look into my case as well.
Positive Ending
Finally, I got the call from the police station for verification. This time I went before the appointed time, fully equipped with all the documents such as identity proofs, address proofs, qualifications, work experience letters etc.
The young lady constable quickly went through my documents. She asked me some general questions about the length of my residence at current address, which countries I have visited in the past, where do I presently work, which country I am interested to immigrate etc. While doing her paperwork, she also told me some interesting stories about other candidates and sought my opinion about migrating to Dubai, which sadly I had no idea about.
Once all the paperwork was ready, I was asked to sit in front of the chief inspector. He gave me a cursory glance, trying to judge whether I am worthy of passport or not. Finally, with an air of superiority, he took the pen from his assistant and signed on my application.
Phew! It was like winning a marathon and to add to my joy, I didn’t have to pay a single penny as a bribe, which is rare in such cases. Triumphant, I thanked my stars and walked back home to take care of the next pending task.
Moving To Australia Series
- Moving To Australia – The Idea
- 10 Reasons Why I Chose Australia
- Which Work Visa Is Right For You?
- Should I Go With Migration Agent?
- Introduction To Skilled Visa Points System
- How To Prepare For Skills Assessment – Part 1
- How To Prepare For Skills Assessment – Part 2
- How To Clear IELTS In First Attempt – Part 1
- How To Clear IELTS In First Attempt – Part 2
- How To Clear IELTS In First Attempt – Part 3
- EOI – Express Your Desire To Migrate
- Getting Visa Invitation
- Lodging Visa Application And Making Visa Payment
- Getting Evidence of Functional English
- Undergoing Health Examination – The Whole Story
- Getting Indian PCC And The Road Ahead
