1711849 (Refugee)

The applicant, a citizen of Liberia, sought review of a decision concerning their application for a protection visa. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) was required to determine whether it had jurisdiction to hear the application for review, which had been lodged outside the prescribed time limit.

The central legal issue was whether the applicant had been validly notified of the original decision, which would trigger the commencement of the time period for lodging an application for review. Section 494C of the relevant Act stipulated the circumstances under which a person is taken to have been notified of a decision.

The Tribunal found that the applicant was taken to have been notified of the decision in April 2017, pursuant to section 494C of the Act. Consequently, the prescribed period for lodging an application for review expired in May 2017. As the application for review was received by the Tribunal on 4 June 2017, it was not made within the statutory timeframe. The Tribunal concluded that it lacked jurisdiction to consider the application for review.