Mofid Bebawy: registration cancelled by OMARA on 14 Feb 2019

What the Authority decided

On 14 February 2019, the Office of the Migration Agents Registration Authority (the Authority) decided to cancel the registration of registered migration agent Mofid Bebawy (MARN 1066880), following an investigation into 10 complaints in relation to the Agent's conduct. The Authority was satisfied that the Agent had breached clauses 2.1, 2.4, 2.9A, 2.23, 3.1, 5.2, 5.5, 6.1, 6.1A, 7.1, 7.1A and 7.2 of the Code of Conduct for registered migration agents, and was not a person of integrity or not a fit and proper person to give immigration assistance.

The Authority found that the Agent had prepared and submitted no less than five fraudulent documents to the Department and had encouraged his clients to be complicit in this, exposing them to the possibility of criminal prosecution, and demonstrating a blatant disregard for the law. The Authority was satisfied that the Agent had repeatedly and knowingly provided statements to the Authority that were false and/or misleading when responding to the complaints. In addition, the Agent was found to have inappropriately managed client funds, failed to issue Service Agreements and Statements of Service to clients, despite withdrawing client monies from his business accounts, and to have not maintained proper and accurate client records relating to the complaints investigated.

An abridged version of the Authority’s decision can be accessed below. Personal details have been removed in the interests of protecting the privacy of the persons involved. The Agent applied for review of the cancellation decision through the Administrative Appeals Tribunal on 14 March 2019. 0n 16 December 2021 the AAT affirmed the cancellation decision

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 cancellation means if this was your agent

The registration is removed. The agent's name comes off the Register of Migration Agents and they may not give immigration assistance. A cancellation is usually accompanied by a period during which the person may not be registered again.

Nobody is acting on your matter right now. Treat this as urgent, and start with who the Department is writing to.

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.