Hello everyone! My partner is currently on an essential skill visa through his Sous Chef occupation and I am on a partner visa with him. I took on an employment as an Restaurant Manager at the same Restaurant and our actual intent was to apply for residency with those two skilled jobs. With my job we reached 170 points, but unfortunately my partner didn't reach the required IELTS score, so we will have to let this EOI go because we won't make it on time with the second IELTS test. Unfortunately we are very unhappy with our employer as he is taking advantage of us being dependent on him. Everything is handeld very unprofessional (I still don't have a work contract for example) and we gave up the hope of beeing able to apply for residency with this employer.
So our new plan is to find a new employer for my partner for a new Essential skill visa, since his current one is running out in a view months and either a new Restaurant Manager job for me (which isn't that easy to find in the area) or an NZQA assessment of my partners chef apprenticeship in Europe to get some extra points for a recognized qualification.
We already know we will have to go for a full assessment. Does anyone have any experiences for the austrian apprenticeship system which consists of half a year full time theoretical school and 2.5 years practical training in a hotel/restaurant? My partner has 6+ years of international experience after that. Does he have to be assessed level 4 to gain any extra points? Are there any points for level 3 for example? Is there a realistic choice of NZQA assessing his qualification successfully? I heard the school needs to be under the national ministry of education? It is and he has a chef certificate from the chamber of commerce in Austria. How does this assessment work and how long can it take? It would be terrible to pay all this money and then not have anything from it!
Thank you so much for your help and input. We are really thankful for any advice!
Cheers!