News centre
Pacific visitor visa applications to stay online-only
Visitor Visa applications by applicants in the Pacific Islands Forum countries (excluding Australia) are staying online permanently.
Visitor Visa applications have been online-only for people applying from the Pacific Islands Forum countries since May 2022.
Online applications have also been required for:
- the border exception process during the COVID-19 pandemic, and
- registrations for the Pacific Access and Samoan Quota residence categories.
This is because people could not submit applications in-person at our Pacific offices.
Since applications have moved online, we have seen higher quality applications being submitted from Pacific applicants. If high quality information is provided to us, this helps to improve processing times.
Applying online gives applicants more visibility of the progress of their application. Applicants receive email notifications and their Immigration Online dashboard shows them the status of their application in real-time.