Specialist mobilisation
Putting an overseas specialist on a FIFO roster: the employer’s visa options
Overseas workers joining a fly-in fly-out or drive-in drive-out roster need a visa with work rights, and which one applies turns on whether the role is a defined short-term engagement or an ongoing position. A defined, short-term campaign generally sits with the Subclass 400; an ongoing roster role is a Subclass 482 matter. Resource Visa advises Australian resources employers on both.
Every engagement starts with an employer. We don’t take on individuals seeking a visa on their own. If you need help with your own visa, you can search the Register of Migration Agents at mara.gov.au.
Rosters
Why rosters complicate the visa question
The complication is that a roster is a pattern, not a continuous block. A worker on a two-and-one rotation is in Australia for two weeks, out for one, and back again. Whether that reads as a short defined engagement or as ongoing employment depends on how many cycles there are and what the underlying role actually is, and that distinction drives which visa applies.
Short-term work
Short-term roster work: the Short Stay Specialist visa (subclass 400)
Where the work is a defined campaign, a shutdown spanning three rotations, a commissioning program, an inspection campaign, the Subclass 400 generally fits. The subclass 400 (Temporary Work (Short Stay Specialist)) visa is for short-term, highly specialised work in Australia where the skills aren’t readily available locally. The 400 is the specialist’s own application. Your business supports it with an invitation and evidence. There’s no sponsorship approval or nomination stage and no sponsorship obligations, but your business must not let anyone work in breach of their visa conditions.
The application needs to show the roster pattern and the campaign’s end point, not just the total days worked. A roster that runs to a handover date is evidence of non-ongoing work. A roster with no stated end is the opposite.
Ongoing roles
Ongoing roster roles: the Skills in Demand visa (subclass 482)
Where the position is a permanent slot on a rotating crew, you are filling a role, not delivering a scope, that is ongoing employment however the hours are arranged, and the pathway is the Subclass 482 Skills in Demand.
This requires your business to be an approved sponsor, and brings sponsor obligations. Those obligations do not pause when the worker is on their off-swing.
Time in Australia
How time in Australia is counted on a Short Stay Specialist visa (subclass 400)
Normally up to three months in any 12-month period, counting every 400 stay with any employer. Up to six months only in exceptional circumstances, on strong evidence. A specialist who has already spent time in Australia on a 400 in the last 12 months may be granted only the balance, so offshore and FIFO rosters that add up to more than three months a year need a different visa. Work out the count before you set the rotation, not after.
The three-month line
Rosters that cross the three-month line
If a campaign is going to run past three months, the honest options are:
- Phase it. Different specialists covering different scopes, each with a defensible short-term case. Splitting a program into phases works only where each phase is a genuinely separate scope, documented before anyone travels.
- Move to the 482. If the role is genuinely ongoing, treat it as ongoing.
- Restructure the scope. Sometimes the work divides naturally at a milestone.
What does not work is running consecutive 400s for the same worker on the same roster and hoping the pattern is not noticed. It reads exactly as what it is. A refusal doesn’t disappear: it becomes part of the specialist’s history on later applications, and the Department looks at how a business uses the 400 over time.
Remote sites
Remote sites, accommodation and the practical checklist
Things that are not visa conditions but that derail roster mobilisations anyway:
- Site inductions and competency verification that can only be completed onshore
- Medicals and fitness-for-work assessments with lead times of their own
- Remote-site accommodation allocated to a roster slot rather than a person
- Charter flight manifests locked days ahead of departure
- Certification recognised overseas but requiring local verification or a ticket
These sit outside the visa, but between grant and the first productive shift. Build them into the timeline.
The process
How a mobilisation runs
Same-business-day triage.
The work, the site, the dates, the fit, and an honest read on whether the 400 is the right instrument.
One document request.
A single consolidated list, not a drip-feed. The one variable nobody controls is how fast your documents reach us, which is why we ask for everything once.
Lodged within two business days of a complete file.
For crews, we agree the lodgement timetable at triage.
Business case assembled and evidenced, your review, then lodgement. That’s how fast we work. Decisions and processing times rest with the Department of Home Affairs.
Ongoing
Standing arrangements
For OEM service divisions and shutdown contractors that mobilise repeatedly: preferred-supplier arrangements, batch mobilisations against your shutdown calendar, one nominated contact, and each specialist’s 400 history checked before every lodgement.
Enquiries after 3pm AWST, on weekends or on WA public holidays are triaged the next business day.
FAQs
Frequently asked questions
The subclass 400 (Temporary Work (Short Stay Specialist)) visa is for short-term, highly specialised work in Australia where the skills aren’t readily available locally. Normally up to three months in any 12-month period, counting every 400 stay with any employer. Up to six months only in exceptional circumstances, on strong evidence. A specialist who has already spent time in Australia on a 400 in the last 12 months may be granted only the balance, so offshore and FIFO rosters that add up to more than three months a year need a different visa.
This is not a reliable approach. A refusal doesn’t disappear: it becomes part of the specialist’s history on later applications, and the Department looks at how a business uses the 400 over time. If the role is ongoing, the 482 is the correct instrument.
Normally up to three months in any 12-month period, counting every 400 stay with any employer. Up to six months only in exceptional circumstances, on strong evidence. A specialist who has already spent time in Australia on a 400 in the last 12 months may be granted only the balance, so offshore and FIFO rosters that add up to more than three months a year need a different visa. The realistic options are phasing the work across different specialists or moving to a Subclass 482. Splitting a program into phases works only where each phase is a genuinely separate scope, documented before anyone travels.
No. Sponsor obligations start when you’re approved, and some continue after the sponsorship ends. They include giving equivalent terms and conditions, keeping records, telling the Department about certain changes within 28 days, paying reasonable return travel costs if asked, and cooperating with inspectors. Breaches can lead to sanctions, including bars on sponsoring, cancellation, infringement notices, civil penalties and enforceable undertakings.
Reviewed by a Registered Migration Agent (MARN 1686595) · Last reviewed [date]
Keep reading
Related pages
Short Stay Specialist visa (subclass 400)
The subclass 400 (Temporary Work (Short Stay Specialist)) visa is for short-term, highly specialised work in Australia where the skills aren’t readily available locally.
Skills in Demand visa (subclass 482)
Sponsoring an ongoing role under the Subclass 482 Skills in Demand visa. The three streams, what your business must do, and the obligations that follow.
Sponsor Obligations & Monitoring
What sponsorship commits your business to: records, notifications, equivalent terms, and what happens when the Department asks.
Book a 20-minute mobilisation briefing
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