How we select immigration lawyers

What a shortlist is, and what it isn't

Each city page is a shortlist of law firms that do immigration work from an office in that city. It's a starting point for people who don't know where to begin. It isn't a list of every good immigration lawyer in the city, and it isn't advice about which visa or which lawyer is right for you.

Lawyers only

Every firm on this site has at least one Australian legal practitioner doing migration work, and we check each of them on a state register of lawyers. Registered migration agents who aren't lawyers can also give visa advice, but they aren't listed here. Only a lawyer can represent you in court, for example when a tribunal decision goes to judicial review. Lawyers with a current practising certificate don't need to register as migration agents, so a lawyer without a MARN is normal.

Step 1: finding every firm we can

For each city we search the way a person looking for help would, using searches like "immigration lawyer", "migration lawyer", "partner visa lawyer" and "visa refusal lawyer" with the city and its main suburbs. We also go through the official lists of accredited immigration law specialists, which turn up firms that don't advertise much.

Every distinct firm we find goes on a longlist with a note on whether it was included and why. The "firms checked" number on each city page is the length of that longlist, including the migration agencies we checked and left out because no lawyer was named. Across the cities published so far, that's 265 firms.

Step 2: who can be included

A firm can be on a city shortlist if:

• it has a staffed office in that city, with a street address on its own website;
• migration law is its main practice, or it has a named migration team in that office;
• it names the lawyers who do that work, and we found each of them on a state register.

We leave out migration agencies with no lawyer named, referral and lead-generation services, firms that only meet online with no local lawyers, firms where migration is a minor sideline, firms whose websites we couldn't check, and firms with a lawyer who has a disciplinary finding on a legal regulator's register or on the OMARA list of disciplinary decisions. Community legal centres and refugee legal services aren't on the shortlists because they aren't private firms, but every city page lists the local ones separately.

The shortlists focus on firms that act for individuals and families. Firms that mainly run visa programs for large employers are left off.

Step 3: what we check about each firm

• Practising status. Every lawyer named on a listing is checked on a state register of practising lawyers, usually the one for the state their office is in. Some lawyers hold a practising certificate from another state, and the profile says which register they were found on. If we can't find someone, they aren't named on the page.
• Accredited specialists. The Law Society of NSW, the Law Institute of Victoria, the Queensland Law Society and the Law Society of South Australia accredit specialists in immigration law. A lawyer is only shown as an accredited specialist if we found them on one of those official lists, and we say which body accredited them. If a firm's website says someone is a specialist and we can't find them on a list, we don't repeat the claim.
• Migration agent registration. If a lawyer also holds a MARN, we only show it when we've found it on the OMARA register.
• Fees. Many immigration firms publish a first-consultation fee or fixed fees for some visas. We show only what the firm's own website says, with the date we checked. We never describe a consultation as free unless the firm says so.
• Languages. We list the languages a firm says its lawyers or staff speak.
• Addresses and phone numbers. We take them from the firm's own website. Where a firm's Google listing shows a different address or phone number, we follow the firm's website and recheck.

Each listing has a sources section with the links we used and the date we read them.

Step 4: choosing the shortlist

From the eligible firms we pick up to ten per city. We look at, in rough order:

1. Migration law focus. Firms that only do migration law, or have a named migration team, come before general practices.
2. Depth in that office. How many named lawyers do migration work from the city office.
3. Accredited specialists confirmed on an official list.
4. Clear information for clients. Whether the firm says who you'll deal with, what visas and matters it handles, and how first consultations work and what they cost.
5. Variety. A useful list has a mix: small specialist practices, larger teams, firms that run tribunal and court work, and firms that work in particular languages.

We don't give firms scores. Two offices of the same firm don't both go on one city list. Some cities have fewer than ten firms, because we don't pad a list to reach a number.

Selection is editorial. Order is alphabetical.

The steps above decide which firms appear on a city page. They don't decide where a firm appears. Once a shortlist is chosen, firms are shown in alphabetical order by name, both in the comparison table and in the profiles below it. That order isn't a ranking, and a firm near the top isn't a better choice than one near the bottom.

Google ratings, how much a firm publishes, and any business relationship with the publisher don't change the order. Filters on a page only hide firms that don't match what you picked; they don't re-rank the rest.

Google ratings

Where we show a Google rating, it's the rating and review count from the firm's Google Business Profile, refreshed regularly and labelled as a Google rating. We only show it once a firm has at least 5 reviews. Ratings don't change the order of a shortlist. We don't hide or remove a firm because of its rating, and we don't quote individual reviews.

What we don't check

We haven't used these firms ourselves, interviewed them or reviewed their files. We can't tell you whether a visa will be granted, how a firm will handle your matter or what it will cost. Visa application charges paid to the Department of Home Affairs are separate from a lawyer's fees. Before you engage a firm, ask about costs, who will do the work and how they'll keep you updated, and ask for a written costs agreement.

Paid placements

At present there are no paid listings or sponsored placements on this site, and no firm has paid to be on a shortlist. Selection and checking follow the steps on this page for every firm. The advertising disclosure explains how any paid arrangement would be shown if that ever changes.

Updates and corrections

Each city page shows when it was last updated. Lawyers move, offices close and fees change. If something on a page is wrong or out of date, please tell us with a link to where the correct information is published. Firms can ask us to correct their details at any time, and there's no charge for that.