What are the steps to apply for a New Zealand visa?

Immigration New Zealand sets the process out in this order on its summary page:

1. Decide which visa. INZ publishes more than 170 visas. Which one fits is a question about your own situation — it is not one we can answer for you, and neither can anybody who is not licensed. Read the published criteria on our visa pages or on immigration.govt.nz and take the question to a licensed adviser if it is not obvious.
2. Check the requirements. Health, character and identity, funds, and the skills or relationship the visa is built around.
3. Prepare your documents. INZ specifically says to allow time for translations. Medicals and police certificates have their own turnaround and their own expiry dates, which is why this step is where applications stall.
4. Apply and pay. Online for most visas, on paper for some. Payment is taken at submission and is not refunded if the application is declined.
5. Wait for a decision. INZ notes that November to March is slower.

The published processing time for each visa — INZ's own "80% within" figure — is listed side by side in the processing-time lookup.

Online applications go through Enhanced Immigration Online, and INZ requires a RealMe account to use it. Create that before you start, not halfway through.

You upload your documents and photos, and pay by card in the same session. INZ notes that a card payment may need 3D Secure — the extra verification step your bank sends — so a card that works for ordinary online shopping can still fail here if your bank has not enabled it.

INZ publishes a "from" fee on each visa's own page. These were the published figures on the day we checked:

• Visitor Visa — from NZD $441
• Accredited Employer Work Visa — from NZD $1,540
• Fee Paying Student Visa — from NZD $850
• Skilled Migrant Category Resident Visa — from NZD $6,450
• NZeTA — from NZD $17, and INZ says it is cheaper through the app than the website

The word *from* is doing real work. INZ states that fees vary by your citizenship and by where you apply from, so the figure on the page is a floor. The visa fee calculator adds these published floors up for everybody in an application, and lists what they leave out.

Fees are not refunded if your application is declined. INZ's own words: "We do not refund the fee, even if we decline your application." Waivers exist for refugees, protected persons and victims of family violence.

International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy (IVL): NZD $100. INZ says most international visitors pay it, charged every time, and it is non-refundable. It is paid when you request an NZeTA or when you apply for your visa.

INZ publishes exemptions for Australian and New Zealand passport holders, many Pacific Island nations, transit passengers at Auckland Airport, resident visa holders, and Business Visitor Visa or APEC Business Travel Card holders.

There is also an immigration levy. INZ confirms it exists — it says it will "also ask you to pay an immigration levy" — but does not publish the amount anywhere outside an interactive fee lookup we could not read. So we do not publish an amount. Use INZ's fee tool for your own visa and citizenship rather than a number you read somewhere.

Not at the form. Three things have their own clocks, and they run in parallel with nothing else:

• Medical certificates must be less than 3 months old when INZ receives the application — see medical and character requirements.
• Police certificates must be less than 6 months old at submission, and some countries take months to issue one — see police certificates.
• Translations of any document not in English, which INZ singles out as a thing to allow time for.

Start those three before you start the form, not after, and note that a medical that expires while INZ is deciding can have to be redone.

Only a licensed immigration adviser, a New Zealand lawyer, or somebody exempt under section 11 of the Immigration Advisers Licensing Act 2007 may prepare or lodge an application for you. INZ's rule is blunt: an application prepared by a person who is neither licensed nor exempt must be refused.

That is worth a five-minute check before you pay anybody. How to check an adviser's licence walks through the register.