1714487 (Refugee)

The applicant sought review of a decision concerning a protection visa application, having been refused by the Department of Home Affairs. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) was required to determine whether it had jurisdiction to hear the applicant's review application, which was lodged outside the prescribed time limit.

The central legal issue was whether the applicant's review application was made within the time prescribed by the *Migration Act 1958* (Cth). This involved determining the date on which the applicant was taken to have been notified of the original decision, as this date triggers the commencement of the time period for lodging a review application.

The Tribunal applied section 494C of the *Migration Act 1958* (Cth), which deems notification of a decision to have occurred on a specific date. In this instance, the Tribunal found that the applicant was taken to have been notified of the decision on 13 March 2017. Consequently, the prescribed period for lodging an application for review expired on 9 April 2017. As the application for review was not received by the Tribunal until 6 July 2017, it was lodged out of time.

The Tribunal concluded that the application for review was not made in accordance with the relevant legislative requirements. Therefore, the Tribunal determined that it had no jurisdiction to consider the merits of the applicant's case.