Access to an individual’s movement records is important for applications with residency requirements. Some applications calculate the time a person must be in Australia to the day. This includes the Subclass 888 - Business Innovation and Investment (Permanent) visa and Australian citizenship applications by conferral. Getting dates wrong and therefore the time spent in Australia wrong, can result in the application being refused.

Added to this complexity is the prevalence of disappearing entry and exit stamps. For many countries, e-gates remove the need for manual checks by border officials and the stamping of passports as these records are now computerised. This makes tracking days spent in and outside of Australia more difficult, especially for jetsetters.

Australian citizens, permanent and temporary visa holders can request access to their own movement records and if authorised the movement records of third parties. This service has been available for many years, however, it may not be as well-known as other services, such as the Visa Entitlement Verification Online (VEVO) service, which returns a person’s Australian visa and other entitlements.

Movement records used to, and currently still can, be obtained by emailing a completed and signed Form 1395.

From 1 June 2021 anyone requiring access to movement records can make an online application instead. This is done using a web form.

What is received is a printout of entries that include: arrival and departure dates, passport number used, port of departure or entry, flight/vessel details, visa class and subclass, and visa expiry date if any.

While movement records can provide insight to a person’s movements to and from Australia, it does have its limitations. The webpage warns that it will not provide movement records before 1981 as these are stored at the National Archives of Australia. It also cannot provide the countries where the person travelled to and from although the flight/vessel numbers may assist in jogging memories.

It seems there is still manual processing involved with this new process. While a web form is a step in the right direction it would be hoped that eventually these records could be integrated with VEVO, so access can be instant.