An Australian Does Not Use the Work Visa System at All - the Resident Visa Granted at the Border Already Carries the Right to Work
written for your nationality by name
The general rule it sits on
New Zealand separates working here from settling here, and the two halves are priced completely differently. The temporary half is the Accredited Employer Work Visa, which is not one application but three: an employer gets accredited, that employer gets a Job Check approved for the specific job, and only then does the worker apply. Its pay rule, in instruction WA3.15.5, is that the remuneration must be at or above the New Zealand adult minimum wage, and that an immigration officer must be satisfied the rate is not less than the market rate for that occupation - no multiple of a median wage, no published figure, a judgement the officer makes on factors the instruction lists, including what a New Zealand citizen or resident would be paid for the same job and any collective agreement for the industry. The visa that results is tightly conditioned: one occupation, one employer, one location, full time, at or above a specified remuneration level, with evidence of payment on demand, and no placement with a controlling third party unless the Job Check approved it. It runs for as long as the employment is offered up to three or five years depending on the role, and instruction WA4.11 then puts a ceiling on the whole stay - reach the end of the maximum continuous stay period and you must be outside New Zealand for twelve consecutive months before a further first AEWV can be granted. Holding a visitor or working holiday visa in the meantime does not count towards those twelve months, and time on the AEWV counts whether or not you were in the country. The residence half is the Skilled Migrant Category, which since the 2023 rebuild is not a general points race but three pathways built on a single published number: the SMC wage threshold, $35.00 an hour from 9 March 2026, with fixed multipliers of 1.1, 1.2, 1.5, 2 and 3 times it. The points-based pathway needs six points from income, qualification or New Zealand registration, or from one of those combined with skilled work experience here; the skilled work experience pathway needs three years of directly relevant experience in an ANZSCO skill level 1-3 role plus two years in New Zealand paid at 1.1 or 1.2 times the threshold; the trades and technician pathway needs a level 4 qualification, two and a half years post-qualification experience and eighteen months in New Zealand. Every pathway requires the principal applicant to be aged 55 or younger at the time the residence application is made. And the threshold that applies is not today's: it is the one in effect when the applicant began accruing the New Zealand work experience they rely on, or when they were invited to apply, or when their work visa was granted if that was within five months of starting.