The New Parent Retirement Category
On the 29th March 2010, a new immigration category is being released, which could make things easier for immigrants to bring their parents out to new Zealand.
If they have money of course.
My personal take on this is that I find these kinds of systems to be not much more ethical that legalised bribery. “Give us your money and we will let you in” does not sound much better than handing a brown envelope stuffed full of used notes to your case officer.
So, what’s the deal?
Firstly – there are actually two new retirement visas, which brings New Zealand more in line with Australia, who have long had a 2 year retirement visa option which was lacking here. There is a temporary retirement visa, allowing people to stay here for up to 2 years. The other is a permanent visa, and this is the one for parents of immigrants who are either residents or citizens.
Parent Retirement Category
The point of this is to bring in families of residents who have lots of money (NZD $1,000,000) and are willing to bribe invest it in New Zealand for four years. Actually I’m sure the point is to get a lot of money for New Zealand – the fact that it brings in peoples families is a side issue.
To qualify you need:
- an adult child who lives in New Zealand and who is either a New Zealand citizen or resident
- Meet Centre of Gravity requirements
- Be willing to invest $1,000,000 in New Zealand for 4 years: in one or more of the following:
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- Government Bonds, Company bonds traded on the NZDX, or bonds from NZ firms with at least a BBB rating
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- Shares in New Zealand companies including in Managed funds.
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- Must be capable of making a return, and can contribute to the NZ economy,
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- Must be invested in NZ$
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- Must be legal, not for personal use, invested in property or stuck in the bank or a finance company.
- Must have $500,000 in settlement funds and earn $60,000 a year
- Meet the standard health end character requirements. (No matter how rich you are – they are still going to make your life hell with medical assessments!)
Now- the really really bad news.
They are combining the number of spaces available for the old parent category and this new parent retirement category – and there only 3440 – 3740 places available. There are currently 7305 parents in the queue waiting for parent sponsorship places as it stands, so it still looks like a 2 year backlog. Of course, now the ones with money go straight to the front of the queue, because they effectively come out of this queue and put in another application, and New Zealand has made it crystal clear they will prioritise people who can afford the bribe investment over the rest of us plebs without rich parents.
It costs $2,600 to apply. But then if you can afford to tie up $1,000,000 with the government for 4 years, that’s hardly an issue is it?
You will have 12 months once approved in principle to pay the bribe investment, and you will be given a 12 month visa to enter New Zealand to look at investment opportunities. (Like the internet? None of the approved investments on the list requite more than Internet access and the willingness to tie up a lot of money for four years)
The policy is run through the business migration branch in Wellington. This is fabulous news as it gets people out of the abusive hands of the London Family Residence team. I knew there had to be a silver lining somewhere.
Bloody hell I am so relieved my family are in and through this mess. I pity anyone who has not yet been able to apply under the normal parent category, because unless your parents have the money, it looks like NZ may dump them on the scrap heap.
Make sure you are really clear on this: this does not provide any EXTRA parent spaces.
It merely allows those parents with money to come in straight away, without waiting for their children to prove their worth to New Zealand for 3 years. People currently in the parent queue could potentially find themselves being expected to wait a lot longer for a place to become available as the places currently available go to the people with more money. So if someone comes in as a skilled migrant on the 1st April 2010, their parents can apply for the parent retirement visa on April 2nd 2010. Without the child having proved any benefit to new Zealand or ability to settle here whatsoever.
Once again, immigrants who have bent over backwards to be a benefit to New Zealand and have earned the right through that benefit are about to get shat on.
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Redundancy Tax Credit – make sure you know about it.
This is particularly for those people at IBM NZ who have not been told by the company that they are entitled to it.
Way back in 2007, seems like another century sometimes, the IRD came out with a little sweetener if you lost your job. A redundancy tax credit. This was because many people who were being made redundant were being pushed up into a higher tax bracket, because for reasons that confound me personally, redundancy pay is not tax free. It just adds insult to injury in my opinion.
Official information can be found at IRD website.
So what are the basics?
- Everyone gets it, not just those pushed into a high tax bracket because of a redundancy lump sum.
- It’s worth 6% of the redundancy payment. (So, no round the world cruise to get over the loss of your job is on the cards)
And the 6% only applies to the ‘redundancy’ portion of your final pay – not to any holiday pay owed, pay in lieu of notice etc. (weekend away at a bach then?)
And then it’s capped at a maximum of $3,600 i.e. $60k redundancy payment. (bottle of coke & two straws please)
3. Claim it now, because it gets paid straight away.
No waiting around for your end of year tax return or anything. The IRD pays direct to your bank account. Although keep in mind that your employer will have taxed the payment at source, so at the end of the tax year, you may still qualify for a tax refund if you’ve not got another job, or have not earnt as much as you did last year.
4. Payments deferred or split across tax years don’t matter that much.
If your company, out of the goodness of their hearts keenness of their own interests, pays you the redundancy in the next tax year, or splits it across tax years – it doesn’t really matter that much. You get the 6% credit on the full amount of the redundancy portion, irrespective of taxable income earned in either year.
So if a full redundancy payment made this year tips you into a higher tax bracket, it may be worth asking if you can defer some of the payment to next year. Otherwise your 6% credit is used bringing your current year tax payment back down to it’s normal level, instead of giving you a straight 6% reduction.
If you already earn more than $70k a year, then it doesn’t matter, since you are already paying the highest rate of tax on your income. Or if in leaving the company you get the juicy pay rise your old employer just wasn’t going to fork out for. In which case you may want all the money now.
Splitting the redundancy payment across tax years would only be a factor if you don’t intend to work for the next six months. You may not have the emergency fund to be able to do that, or your beloved spouse may be tearing their (or your) hair out well before that with having you under their feet all day!
Here’s a quick example;
Say you earn 60k a year, and your redundancy only portion is 20k. This means that where you would normally be paying 33%, as you will go above $70k, you will pay 38% tax on $10k of the redundancy payment. Lets assume you’ve used all your holiday and have to work out your notice, so you get no extra cash.
If you take the payment in the Current Tax Year
Salary = 60k @ 33%
Redundancy = 20k;
10k @ 33% = 3300
10k @ 38% = 3800
-20k @ 6% = 1200
Total tax paid on redundancy = $5,900
Total redundancy in your pocket = $14,100
If you split your redundancy, so the 2nd lot of 10k is paid next year, and lets assume you pick up a job earning the same amount of money.
Current Tax Year
Salary = 60k @ 33%
Redundancy = 10k @ 33% = 3300
-10k @ 6% = 600
Next Tax Year
Salary = 60k @ 33%
Redundancy =10k @ 33% = 3300
-10k @ 6% = 600
Total tax paid on redundancy = $5,400
Total redundancy in your pocket = $14,600
So, splitting redundancy payments means you don’t pay $500 in tax that you don’t have to. Which at 60k salary, is over half a weeks take home pay.
Of course since this is your money, any amount however small, you legally get back from the tax man is worth getting. However, the inconvenience of waiting for some of your redundancy pay may be out weighed by the potential benefit of having all that money sooner.
In any event, make sure you pay the right amount of tax and get every cent of redundancy pay you are supposed to get.
And make sure that company making you redundant doesn’t screw you out of funds you are entitled to because they don’t even have the decency to tell you your rights.
Still not ready to give up on the comic relief :)
Charlie Brookers Newswipe: the most generic news report in the world. While i find this highly hilarious – it also does make the serious point that most news is rubbish, and designed to tell you what to think rather than tell you what is going on.
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More much needed comedy relief.
Most NZ tv adverts are dire – but sometimes they come out with a gem.
So here is Export Gold’s Thirstfighters ad:
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Some much needed comedy relief: part 2.
Just couldn’t resist this one – it’s happened to hubby 3 times now in New Zealand:
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Some much needed comedy relief
I thought we could do with a bit of unadulterated humour round here.
So, courtesy of Mitre 10 – here’s a funny TV advert.
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How redundancy in New Zealand should be handled.
With wonderful timing, theres a really great blog on the Herald Website from employment lawyer Bridget Smith. She went to see the film Up In The Air with George Clooney – which funnily enough we also went to see the other day. Its about a guy who fires people for a living as a consultant, because the bosses are too cowardly to do it.
In it she highlights the important points you need to know about how the process should work here.
Which is different in every way to what happened to hubby last week oddly enough.
While there is no set process for a redundancy, the Employment Relations Act 2000 requires consultation with potentially affected employees about a proposal, before any final decisions are made.
In addition, the common law makes it clear that consultation is more than notification and the process must not be a sham.
Basically, the process under New Zealand law requires an employer to provide potentially affected employees with a memorandum which outlines what is proposed and why.
The employees should be provided with sufficient information in order to be able to provide feedback on the proposal, including possible alternatives and this feedback, including any possible alternatives, must be considered by the employer prior to any final decisions being made.
Hmmm – mustn’t be a sham.
A memorandum explaining what is proposed and why? Nope – didn’t get one of those.
Sufficient information provided? Nope – not yet.
So, New Zealand employees can breathe something of a sigh of relief. The chances of a Corporate Downsizing Expert (or Mr Clooney for that matter) beaming into your office, out of the blue, via video conference, and advising that you have been made redundant, are slim to none.
Not so slim it seems.
Certainly if your employer has any familiarity with employment law in New Zealand and wants to avoid litigation in the form of a personal grievance. Because the reality is, in that situation, even George Clooney would struggle to soften the blow.
I agree: the people in charge of these redundancies (and hubby hasn’t actually been told who was going to make the decision) should have spent a bit of time asking a lawyer what they needed to do instead of messing it up so badly. I cant help but hope they lose their jobs when the next lot of heads have to roll.
It seems management hasn’t quite figured out that if you get rid of all the staff that actually do teh work and make the money, they won’t need managers.
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So, how exactly did we get residence for my brother so quickly? Part 3.
So, unbelievably, we managed to get a meeting, not with the case officer, because there wasn’t one; but with the person in charge of all family residence applications.
I didn’t sleep much, had a migraine when i woke up, and also had a doctors appointment that morning for some tests; which ran late. SO by the time it came to our meeting; i was exhausted, in pain, and terrified. I guess that sounds a bit over dramatic if you haven’t been there, but after the way we were treated by London, I was genuinely worried about what we would be faced with.
What we were faced with, it turns out, was a lovely gentleman, who sat us down, went through the file and told us that in fact they could make a decision on whether Visitor Permits were extended, and that despite what we had been told by other staff, and a $450 an hour lawyer – it does NOT require the immigration minister to intervene.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I really didn’t.
He also looked through the file, and said that he could spend a week or so going through it, and look at whether the residence application could be processed now. I think he could see what a mess I was and took pity on me. I did tell him i hadn’t slept properly in months. It also helped that my brother was through the medical, so it basically made it an easy case to process, and i guess gets them nearer their targets.
I was gobsmacked.
Well, by the time i got home later that evening – a case officer had been assigned. He said it would take a few weeks to process the application. 2 days later, we got an email to say it had been approved in principle, and just had to be verified by management.
I screamed.
A few days later they asked for a letter from the prospective employer stating that the job offer was still available. This was a week after the meeting. We had to wait a few days to get that because the guy was away, but once again he came up trumps and got us a scanned copy via email, which was followed up by a letter in the post. The scan was sent to INZ on the Monday, and the original handed in on the Wednesday.
Wednesday afternoon, just as hubby was phoning me about being redundant, and just 2 weeks after our meeting – my brother opened a letter saying his residence was confirmed and could they have his passport and Migrant Levy.
Thursday morning at 9am I sat in the Wellington office, and 10 minutes later was asking a very nice man if they could possibly take the money in person and let us have the permits today. He didn’t know, but asked the case officer, who said yes, and 10 minutes later I had my brothers passport in my hand with a residence permit in it.
And somehow I did not embarrass myself by bursting into tears in the middle of Immigration in Wellington.
THE END .
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So, how exactly did we get residence for my brother so quickly? Part 2.
We managed to enjoy a family Christmas, but during January, the panic over how to deal with my brother possibly being kicked out of New Zealand started to return. I started not sleeping again, and began to wish I’d never come here in the first place. I started writing a letter to immigration stating the reasons why it would be unreasonable to expect my brother to return to the UK, and just what effect it would have on the rest of us. I also started trying to work out how the hell we would go about selling all our properties if we had to leave. Where would we live? What would we do?If my brother had to go back, my parents would go back. And I just couldn’t bear the thought of them all having to go back when they had given up so much to come out with us.
I emailed the immigration officer who had dealt with the Visitor Permit, to ask some questions about the Job Offer, and what information the employer had to provide to prove the offer was real. The employer was getting a bit concerned, and wanted to get as much sorted out as he could ready for when immigration finally got round to asking. (This is the kinda attitude that makes coming to NZ worthwhile). After two weeks i had no reply, so had to ask again. It didn’t improve my mood.
I was told to ask the Head of the Family Residence team – something that then put me in cold sweat after dealing with the horrid woman in charge in London. But this guy answered my questions quickly and properly. He did suggest (as had the lady dealing with the visitor permit) that a work visa could be organised, but it would have to be Labour Market Tested.
I did point out that an admin job fails the labour market test.
We also decided to ask people we know for letter of support to go in with this, with the intention that all the letters would accompany a second application for a visitors permit.
In the end, I got so worked up, and started to doubt my own judgment. What scared me most was that we had been told this would require the Immigration Minister to make the decision. I shed a lot of tears over my stupidity in arguing about the Immigration Advisors Licensing bill and the fact that it would probably cost my family so much. The frustration was literally overwhelming some days.
I was so at a loss, I actually went to see an Immigration Lawyer. He confirmed that it would take ministerial intervention, and we would have to work hard at convincing him (the minister)that my brother would benefit New Zealand.
Thats when I started to get suss!
You see – the policy clearly states that my brother doesn’t have to benefit NZ. If he was a benefit – he would be able to get a work visa, or residency through the skilled migrant category. The family policy is for people who, like my brother, do not have skills or degree level education. WE are the benefit to NZ, which is how we have the right to migrate here. As a thank you, the Family Policy allows us to bring our families in because we have given three (or 5 by this point) years of our lives to the country, while being separated from our families.
He told us that it would take about three months to get anything seen by the minsiter, so we had best act now. He also told us that probably the best thing to do was for my brother to leave a week before the end of his permit, go to Australia for a week, and come back, when he would in all likelihood get another 6 months stamp in his passport.
What the hell can you say to that as a piece of “immigration advice”???
It cost us $450.
It was also complete rubbish as it turned out.
So still wondering what the hell we were going to do, we sent out emails to our friends and colleagues. People we have worked with, done business with, drank coffee with, and asked them to write letters on our behalf. I can tell you – it wasn’t easy. Most of them had offered before at one point or another, but it is quite another thing to have to go round and ask so many people for help.
We also went for a chat with our mentor. And while we filled him in on what we were doing, he suggested that we try to get in front of the Case officer at immigration. That sent me into another cold sweat, as it was basically the refusal of the London Case officer to speak to us that caused the nightmare my parents application turned into. But i thought – well – it can’t get any worse can it?
So I emailed this chap again and asked for an appointment.
And he gave us one the next day.
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IBM New Zealand redundancies – they are not rumours.
IBM New Zealand has refused to comment on rumours it is making 34 staff redundant in Wellington and merging its northern and southern region sales teams.
Spokeswoman Courtney Allen said IBM “continuously re-balances skills and capabilities to meet the changing needs of clients. While many of our competitors were contracting in response to the global financial crisis, we hired consistently throughout last year with over 80 appointments,” she said.
The leadership team was continually changing to meet the needs of clients and business, Ms Allen said. “This is business as usual for IBM.”
The subsidiary employs about 1000 staff. It last reported a reduced profit of $13.7 million on sales of $391.4m in 2008.
IBM’s United States parent this week cut nearly 1000 jobs from its worldwide work force of 400,000. The New Zealand subsidiary of its biggest global rival, Hewlett-Packard, this week reported a $8.9m loss and a 10.5 per cent drop in sales.
Dismissing the crap from the spokesman as absolute BS, which is what it is, I can confirm that IBM have made 30+ people redundant, with almost no notice and an appalling lack of anything approaching the legal standards for doing so.
Hubby is one of those people.
They were told on Wednesday (the same day believe it or not that we got confirmation of my brother’s residency), and were given till just Monday as a “consultation period”. Although there is no statutory legal minimum period that employers need to give for this “consultation” – 1 week is the standard that has been formed by case law. 3 days is unreasonable, and is grounds for seeking a Personal Grievance.
I cant say too much, as oddly enough, hubby is one of several people it seems who are doing just that. Its been a hatchet job: badly handled by people who really shouldn’t be allowed to keep their jobs, and basically its one almighty cock-up.
We understand that this has been done so quickly to keep the news out of the paper. So glad that didn’t work (and no – it was NOT me that told the Dom Post!)
And this isn’t business as usual for IBM. IBM New Zealand operates in a world of its own, and one that is frankly an embarrassment to the rest of IBM, if it was actually important enough for the rest of IBM to care what was going on down here. IBM as a company has always been clear that technical staff are not treated as lower class workers than management. If you are a technical specialist, which lets face it – IBM does kinda rely on – you can rise in the company as far as your skills will take you. Not so in New Zealand, where managers get easily offended at technical staff getting paid more then them, and and are not above lying through their back teeth to cover up their own lack of effort and skill.
THAT is what is “Business as usual” in IBM New Zealand. We have seen so many people shoved out in the last year or so because a manager didn’t like them: their “face doesn’t fit”. Hubby himself got a bad personal review last month for no other reason than a manager of his was upset over his high salary, and the fact the he wanted a pay rise.
All in all its a shambles. IBM NZ has been becoming more and more toxic as a workplace, and to be honest we knew it was only a matter for time before something like this happened.
Its things like this that mean so many people leave New Zealand. Working for people who just don’t know what they are doing can be very depressing. While there is a huge amount to come to New Zealand for, screwing up what was a brilliant career really wasn’t the plan, and should not be a cost of emigrating here.
So, now what do we do?
Well, not much really. We have an emergency fund which will cover 2 months worth of bills and living expenses, on top of another months pay and nearly 2 months pay in redundancy (at a reduced payment because IBM is not being exactly fair and honest about hubbies salary. Again.)
I cant stress enough the need to make sure you have these funds behind you, especially if you are taking high paid work in New Zealand. Tall Poppy Syndrome is a huge problem here, and if you are good at your job, and/or get paid a lot of money, there are some very short poppies here who will do their best to get rid of you.
We are far from the only ones that have been affected by this: its actually fairly standard. And certainly in high paid IT circles – it seems to be pretty much the only way to get a pay rise. So be prepared. Then if or when it happens, you have the distinct pleasure of being able to sit back and not in any way beg for a job from the people who just shat all over you.
Trust me – that is a nice feeling!
So, hubby has already started the process of having endless coffee meetings, phone calls and interviews. No point in waiting around! Oddly enough although IBM NZ claims it doesn’t need hubby any longer – they still expect him to work out his notice. Again, very different from IBM UK who have the sense to get disgruntled staff off the premises pronto.
And we wait for the lawyers to do their thing.
If you happen to be affected by this – we recommend an employment lawyer in Lower Hutt: Mike Gould at Gibson Sheat. He’s not cheap, but he’s good, and it really is worth every cent if like in this case your employer has not followed the expected process or has bullied you in any way. You are entitled to seek legal advice if you are being made redundant, and if anyone in management claims you are making a threat by saying you will be seeking legal advise, please make sure you tell your lawyer this. If you really cannot afford a private lawyer, don’t forget Citizens advice, who can offer you information for free.
BTW – while NZ staff were given three days “consultation”, UK Staff were given 90 days. Says it all about how New Zealand companies are run.
Mike Gould: Gibson Sheat:
04 569 4873
mike.gould@gibsonsheat.com
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