1614729 (Migration)

This matter concerned an application for approval as a standard business sponsor. The applicant sought to have a prior decision, which refused their application, set aside. The Tribunal was required to determine whether the applicant met the criteria for approval as a standard business sponsor under regulation 2.59 and additional criteria under regulation 2.60S of the Migration Regulations 1994.

The central legal issues before the Tribunal were whether the applicant had applied in the approved form and paid the prescribed fee, was not already a standard business sponsor, was lawfully operating a business, and had met the relevant training benchmarks. Specifically, the Tribunal had to assess whether the applicant's expenditure on training met the requirements of Training Benchmark A or Training Benchmark B, given the business had been trading for more than 12 months.

The Tribunal found that the applicant had satisfied the procedural requirements for application and was not an existing sponsor. Crucially, the Tribunal was satisfied, based on provided documentation including accounts, payslips, BAS, and ASIC extracts, that the applicant was lawfully operating a business in Australia. Regarding the training benchmarks, the Tribunal determined that the applicant had met the requirement of Training Benchmark B, as the expenditure on financial training for two employees alone exceeded 1% of the business's payroll for the relevant period.

The Tribunal set aside the decision not to approve the application and substituted a decision approving the applicant as a standard business sponsor for a period of three years.