Chao Xie: registration suspended by OMARA on 10 May 2022

What the Authority decided

On 10 May 2022, the Office of the Migration Agents Registration Authority (the Authority) suspended the registration of migration agent Mr Chao XIE (MARN: 0961866) for a period of 2 years following an investigation into three complaints in relation to the Agent’s conduct.

The Authority found that the Agent entered into arrangements with offshore entities which allowed for the creation and dissemination of fraudulent documents some which were provided to the Department of Home Affairs (the Department); the offshore entities were also provided access to client’s personal information via the use of the Agent’s emails and ImmiAccounts.

The Agent failed to comply with financial obligations, maintain proper record keeping practices, follow client instructions as well as provide progress updates to his clients. The Agent was also found to have not acted in his client’s legitimate interests and failed to maintain client confidentiality.

The Authority was also satisfied that the Agent and was not a person of integrity, or otherwise not a fit and proper person to give immigration assistance. The Agent was also found to be in breach of clauses 2.1, 2.3, 2.4, 2.8, 2.9, 2.9A, 2.23, 3.1, 3.2, 5.2, 5.5, 6.1, 6.1A, 6.4, 7.2 and 7.4 of the Code of Conduct for Registered Migration Agents.

An abridged version of the Authority’s decision can be accessed on the OMARA disciplinary page.

The decision summary above is reproduced from the Authority's published record of this decision, which also carries the decision document itself. Nothing has been added to it.

What a suspension means if this was your agent

The registration is suspended for a set period. During it the agent may not lawfully give immigration assistance — not to you, not to anyone. Section 280 of the Migration Act makes paid immigration assistance by an unregistered person a criminal offence, and a suspended agent is unregistered for the duration.

This is the outcome that most often catches people mid-matter, because the agent is still there and the suspension has an end date. If your matter can wait, it may be able to wait. If you have a response deadline from the Department inside the suspension period, it cannot.

If this was your agent: the first week

1. Find out where your application actually is. If you have an ImmiAccount, log in. The clock does not stop because your representation did.
2. Check who the Department is writing to. A Form 956 makes an agent the authorised recipient, and correspondence sent to them is taken to have been given to you. A deadline sent to an inbox nobody reads is still a deadline.
3. Get your file. Your documents are yours and the Code requires them back — originals first. How to get your file back.
4. Work out what was paid and what was done. Ask for the itemised invoices and receipts the Code requires. Routes to recover money work better started early.
5. Complain, if there is something to complain about. A published decision does not close your own file. Where to complain, and what OMARA can and cannot do.
6. Only then, find someone else. A new agent needs the file and the dates. The first five steps are what make that first conversation useful instead of exploratory.

What this decision does not mean

It is a decision about one individual on one date. Only a person can be a registered migration agent — a company cannot — so it says nothing about anyone else at the same practice. Decisions of this kind are reviewable, and bars and suspensions expire. The register is where the current position lives.

Decision information sourced from the Office of the Migration Agents Registration Authority and used under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia licence. VisaBid is not affiliated with OMARA or the Department of Home Affairs.