I've had a lot of people back in the UK ask me about the Australian working holiday visa, what it is, what kind of work you can do out here, and whether it's worthwhile doing it. The great thing about a working holiday visa is that you can pretty much make your experience in Australia whatever you want it to be and everybody's experience differs slightly depending on where they have lived, worked and travelled during their time in the country.
A working holiday visa allows you to legally live and work in Australia for one year. The main purpose of this visa is to allow you to save and fund your travels further, which is pretty awesome. You can work for any one company for up to 6 months, and once the 6 months is up you have to find work at a different company. Australia is a brilliant country to save in as it has one of the highest minimum wages in the world at $17.70 p/h, but I've never worked a job that paid me less than $20.
The visa is pretty straightforward to obtain so long as you've been well behaved in life and have no criminal convictions that will hinder your application. You can do it yourself from the Australian government website, or if you're like me and leave it until completely the last minute you can pay an additional fee and get a company to do it for you. I bought mine from STA travel, it took 2 weeks to be accepted and cost me less than £250.
Now lets talk jobs. I've done so many jobs since I've been here. I started with temp casual work working a stall selling kids modelling clay at events and festivals, I worked three weeks at a cafe before I quit, I've done bar work, and I've office temped. Although I enjoyed all of my roles for different reasons, office temping has been by far the best. It's decent hours, decent pay, and I've had nothing but positive experiences with every temp assignment I've worked. The people have been helpful and welcoming, it's been great exposure to different office environments across various industries, and I've learnt loads of new skills. I fully recommend it to anybody with any office or administration experience.
Before I came to Australia I met a few people in Asia who had managed to secure roles in the industries that they worked in back home. When I first arrived I was very keen to remain working in media and slogged pretty hard on applications and made a good few phone calls to various places. Whilst I did have some very positive conversations, none of them were willing to take me on whilst I was on a working holiday visa. You have to understand that big companies have to play by the rules, and it doesn't benefit them to take on a new recruit, train them, and only get a good 4 months from them before having to let them go. Now, if you know somebody in Australia that can set you up with a sweet deal, have a lot of contacts and connections, or are willing to accept a sponsorship visa early on into your working holiday visa, then that's great, but the chances are you're not going to be able to work within the same industry that you did at home and you have to be okay with that. I knew I was only going to be here temporarily and so took this opportunity to work casual jobs and enjoy the variety of work I was offered from my agency all whilst keeping in mind my main goal of save save save so that I can get out and explore this big beautiful country.
The two big players for settling down and finding work in are Melbourne and Sydney. When you get here, you'll meet a lot of people that love Sydney but hate Melbourne, or love Melbourne and hate Sydney. I've yet to meet somebody who loves both. They are both amazing cities for different reasons. Melbourne is full of street art, amazing cafes, culture, bars and live music venues tucked in alleyways. The weather is erratic and it can get a lot cooler here. When I arrived in September it was freezing, I had to buy a coat and honestly I felt that I'd made a terrible mistake. Read about my first experiences of Melbourne here. The summer gets hot, hot, hot. It reached 38 degrees on Christmas day. Sydney is full of iconic landmarks (Hello Sydney Opera House and Darling Harbour!), beautiful beaches, amazing swimming pools integrated into the landscape that overlook the ocean, surfers, free barbecues by the beach and overall the weather is much better. Both of them have an abundance of work. You'd have to weigh up the pros and cons after visiting both, and if I could offer one piece of advice it would be to see as much of Australia as possible before settling down in one place, or at least seeing both of these cities before deciding on one. If you're coming straight to Australia then I would really advise coming with a decent amount of funds behind you so that you can take time to decide what you like. I came to Melbourne straight from backpacking South East Asia for 3 and a half months so my funds were low, but if I could go back and change one thing it would be to see both places before deciding on one.
Now, this post is getting pretty long so I'm going to wrap it up with a short answer. If you want to come and travel, and you want to work somewhere that allows you to extend your travel, or stay in Australia for an extended period of time so that you can see as much of it as possible, then get a working holiday visa. For me, on the whole, it's been an incredible experience. It's been tough at times, it's been challenging, it's been interesting, it's been amazing and wonderful and definitely something that I'll remember for the rest of my life.
The visa is pretty straightforward to obtain so long as you've been well behaved in life and have no criminal convictions that will hinder your application. You can do it yourself from the Australian government website, or if you're like me and leave it until completely the last minute you can pay an additional fee and get a company to do it for you. I bought mine from STA travel, it took 2 weeks to be accepted and cost me less than £250.
Now lets talk jobs. I've done so many jobs since I've been here. I started with temp casual work working a stall selling kids modelling clay at events and festivals, I worked three weeks at a cafe before I quit, I've done bar work, and I've office temped. Although I enjoyed all of my roles for different reasons, office temping has been by far the best. It's decent hours, decent pay, and I've had nothing but positive experiences with every temp assignment I've worked. The people have been helpful and welcoming, it's been great exposure to different office environments across various industries, and I've learnt loads of new skills. I fully recommend it to anybody with any office or administration experience.
Before I came to Australia I met a few people in Asia who had managed to secure roles in the industries that they worked in back home. When I first arrived I was very keen to remain working in media and slogged pretty hard on applications and made a good few phone calls to various places. Whilst I did have some very positive conversations, none of them were willing to take me on whilst I was on a working holiday visa. You have to understand that big companies have to play by the rules, and it doesn't benefit them to take on a new recruit, train them, and only get a good 4 months from them before having to let them go. Now, if you know somebody in Australia that can set you up with a sweet deal, have a lot of contacts and connections, or are willing to accept a sponsorship visa early on into your working holiday visa, then that's great, but the chances are you're not going to be able to work within the same industry that you did at home and you have to be okay with that. I knew I was only going to be here temporarily and so took this opportunity to work casual jobs and enjoy the variety of work I was offered from my agency all whilst keeping in mind my main goal of save save save so that I can get out and explore this big beautiful country.
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| 5 minutes down the road from my place in Melbourne |
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| One of the many stunning views from the Bondi Beach to Coogee Beach walk in Sydney |
Now, this post is getting pretty long so I'm going to wrap it up with a short answer. If you want to come and travel, and you want to work somewhere that allows you to extend your travel, or stay in Australia for an extended period of time so that you can see as much of it as possible, then get a working holiday visa. For me, on the whole, it's been an incredible experience. It's been tough at times, it's been challenging, it's been interesting, it's been amazing and wonderful and definitely something that I'll remember for the rest of my life.
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