You must apply for entry permission when you arrive in New Zealand. You can do this by completing an arrival card, which you are given on the way to New Zealand

ARRIVING IN NEW ZEALAND You can be refused entry permission if:

• You don’t meet our character requirements
• Your circumstances have changed since you were granted a visa
• You refuse to let us to take your photo, or provide us with your fingerprints or an iris scan, if we ask you for them

You can travel in and out of New Zealand as often as you like until your travel conditions expire. To travel after that, you’ll need to apply for and be granted either:

• A Permanent Resident Visa
• A variation of your travel conditions, which would allow you to return to New Zealand at a later date. Your travel conditions will expire 10 years from the date you first arrive in New Zealand as a resident. Your visa label and approval letter will detail the date that your travel conditions expire.

If you’re outside of New Zealand when your travel conditions expire, your visa will expire as well.

Work

You can work in any occupation for any employer in New Zealand

Study

Keep your visa in a valid passport

Keep your visa in a valid passport

If you want to travel, your visa must be in a valid passport.
If your passport expires, you must apply to transfer your visa to a new passport before you can travel.

Transferring my visa to a new passport

To transfer your visa, you must:

• Send us your old and new passports
• Complete an ‘Application for Transfer or Confirmation of a Visa’
• Pay a transfer fee

Sponsorship

For ten years after your resident visa is granted, your sponsor must meet the following sponsorship obligations

• Provide suitable accommodation if you don’t have your own place to live
• Ensure your health and welfare needs are met
• Pay any costs associated with your deportation and repatriation (if required). If you applied for your resident visa before 21 November 2016 your sponsor must meet these obligations for 5 years from the date your resident visa is granted.

If Work and Income make welfare payments to you during this time, we may consider that your sponsor is not meeting their obligations to care for you.If your sponsor does not meet these obligations, we may determine that you have breached your visa conditions and you will be made liable for deportation as a result.

Your sponsor may have to repay any money spent by the New Zealand Government or a third-party as a result of them not meeting their obligations.

Parent Resident Visa expressions of interest

A limited number of people can get a Parent Resident Visa. Currently no expressions of interest for this visa are being selected.

Expressions of interest for Parent Resident Visas

To move to New Zealand to join your adult New Zealand citizen or resident child you must:

Send us an expression of interest (EOI) explaining how you meet the requirements, and be sponsored by your child.

To manage the number of people who can apply for this visa, we usually only select a certain number of expressions of interest.

No EOIs currently being selected

In October 2016, the government decided that no further EOIs for Parent Resident Visas would be selected until further notice. A decision about restarting selections has not yet been made. When a decision is made, we will contact people who have submitted an EOI and publish information on this website.