Immigration New Zealand (INZ) has updated its website with information on visas for victims of family violence.
INZ has two special visa categories for victims of family violence – a temporary work visa and a resident visa. Each visa has a webpage on the INZ website with:
- detailed information on the criteria that victims must meet to be granted a FV visa,
- examples of the evidence they may need to provide, and
- information about INZ visa processing.
Visa processing under COVID-19
All INZ offices are currently closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While some staff are working remotely visa processing capacity is currently limited.
To date INZ has focused its processing resources on COVID-19 related applications or urgent requests of a humanitarian nature. This includes applications for temporary visas for victims of family violence. Please note that at this time we are unable to process the paper-based residence applications and we cannot currently access those applications held in our offices. The website will be updated when residence applications are able to be considered and people will be contacted by the person considering these.
Family Violence temporary visa
Anyone who needs to apply for a Family Violence temporary visa should contact the Immigration Contact Centre (ICC) in the first instance.
The ICC will take some basic details and refer the information on to a priority visa team. They will then get in touch with the person (or their social worker or other authorised support person) and obtain the detail they need to process the visa.