偉道 Latitude Consultants
New Zealand Immigration Specialists
Entrepreneurs Beware (Part 2)
Posted: 27 August 2014
In part 1 of our article (Entrepreneurs Beware), we highlighted what we believe were some inaccuracies in the information provided on the Immigration New Zealand website. To verify whether we had our facts straight, a corresponding letter from LCL was sent to the Branch Manager of the Business Migration Branch.
Here's a copy of our open letter sent:
Contact Us
Preliminary Assessment Service
Want to know your options?
Has your application been declined?
Have you received a letter from Immigration New Zealand?
We received a response from Immigration New Zealand within a relatively short period of time. Here's a copy of the open email in response. LCL commentary can be found on the right hand side.
This is very interesting. The current BB1 policy does not use "and/or". There is only "and", meaning the objective of the policy, as it is currently written requires both "high growth" and "innovation".
Key Point: High growth and innovation are not both required (despite the wording in policy).
Agreed. LCL came to the same conclusion in the first part of this article.
Key Point: Export potential is an added bonus but not a necessary requirement to obtain residence under the Entrepreneur category
Agreed. A new dairy or restaurant business would indeed, not meet export potential or innovation requirements under most circumstances.
This doesn't mean that the application is doomed to fail. It just means the dairy or restaurant business needs high growth (to substitute innovation, see above) and some other benefit to New Zealand (to substitute export potential), such as employment of local New Zealand citizens or residents (which most businesses do anyway).
Key Point: Most businesses aren't going to have export potential or innovation, but the application for residence under the Entrepreneur category can still succeed through substitution of other criteria.
This really hits the nail on the head. INZ do not assess whether a business has high-growth, innovation and/or export potential twice. They do it only once during the EWV stage.
Key Point: If you already have a EWV, chances are you will be granted residence as long as your business is consistent with the business plan originally presented.
See above. Businesses don't need to have export potential in order to qualify for either the EWV or Entrepreneur Residence visa.
See above. Innovation really has no place in this policy because INZ considers that "high growth" can substitute "innovation". Every business must have "high growth" potential, so that means by default, no business needs innovation. Innovation seems to be a redundant concept.
LCL Summary Comments
What really came as a surprise was that Immigration New Zealand were able to take the text of policy, and insert interpretative words as they saw fit. The prime example is the policy objectives of BB1 and the insertion of the word "or" between "high-growth" and "innovation".
While this particular insertion is good for applicants, the bigger question is how we feel about "unwritten" and "hidden" policy which we only uncover through such an investigation. Contact us with your views.