Sponsorship approval sits underneath every employer-sponsored pathway
A business cannot nominate a position or sponsor a worker until it is first approved as a standard business sponsor. That approval is assessed against your business, independently of any worker or position — and it is the step most first-time sponsors underestimate, because it is easy to assume the harder part is finding the right candidate.
Subclass 482 SID Visa Skills in Demand, up to four years, across the Specialist Skills, Core Skills and Labour Agreement streams. → Subclass 186 ENS Visa Employer Nomination Scheme, a permanent visa reached via Direct Entry, Temporary Residence Transition or a labour agreement. → Subclass 494 SESR Visa Skilled Employer Sponsored Regional, five years in regional Australia, then Subclass 191. →Every one of the three pathways above begins from the same starting point: approval of your business as a work sponsor under section 140E of the Migration Act 1958. This page addresses that first step, and the obligations that continue once it is granted — not the criteria for the position or the visa applicant, which are covered on the pages above.
Source: Migration Act 1958, section 140E, compilation C2026C00232, compilation date 4 June 2026, Compilation No. 171.
Is your business ready to sponsor?
Send us a few details about your business and we will tell you what standard business sponsorship approval will involve for you — no obligation.
What standard business sponsorship approval actually is
Standard business sponsorship is the Department's approval of your business as a sponsor of overseas workers under Subclass 482, 186 or 494. It is a separate decision from the nomination of any particular position, and separate again from the visa application of any particular worker — three approvals, at three stages, each against its own criteria. Approval as a sponsor does not itself entitle you to sponsor a specific person; it establishes that your business meets the threshold requirements the Department applies to a sponsoring entity, which broadly go to whether the business is lawfully and actively operating in Australia (or has made arrangements to commence doing so), has no adverse information recorded against it or its key personnel that would tell against approval, and is otherwise a suitable entity to hold sponsorship obligations.
The trap in this section
The specific regulatory criteria for standard business sponsorship approval sit in the Migration Regulations 1994 and are not individually set out on this page. We confirm the exact requirements against the current compilation for your business at consultation, rather than publishing a checklist that goes stale the moment the Regulations are amended.
Source: Migration Act 1958, sections 140E and 140GB, compilation C2026C00232, compilation date 4 June 2026, Compilation No. 171. The regulation-level criteria for approval as a standard business sponsor (Migration Regulations 1994) have not been individually verified for this page and require a /law-check pass before publication — see handover.
Standard business sponsor, or accredited sponsor
Accredited sponsor status is a separate, higher tier available to certain approved sponsors that meet additional requirements, and it carries practical advantages — among them, the ability to advertise a nominated position on the sponsor's own website for labour market testing purposes, which the ordinary standard business sponsor cannot rely on. Whether a particular business qualifies for accreditation, and what accreditation currently requires, depends on criteria set by instrument that we confirm at consultation rather than restate here in generic terms.
| Consideration | Standard business sponsor | Accredited sponsor |
|---|---|---|
| Can nominate positions under 482, 186 and 494 | Yes | Yes |
| May advertise on own website for labour market testing | No | Yes, in specified circumstances |
| Eligibility requirements | Set by Division 2.19 and related provisions | Additional criteria, confirmed at consultation |
| Ongoing obligations under Division 2.19 | Apply in full | Apply in full |
Flagged for /law-check: the advertising exemption for accredited sponsors is referred to in LIN 18/036 (see the labour market testing citation below) as an established fact; the specific eligibility criteria for accreditation itself are not cited here and must be verified against the current instrument before this table is relied upon.
Whichever position you are in, the obligations are the same once approved
Becoming an approved sponsor for the first time
We assess whether your business meets the threshold for approval before you lodge, so an avoidable refusal does not sit on your record.
- Assessing your business against the approval requirements
- Preparing the evidence of trading and financial standing the Department expects
- Lodging the sponsorship application and managing any request that follows
- Explaining, in plain terms, the obligations you take on once approved
Already an approved sponsor
Approval is not a one-off event. We help existing sponsors meet the obligations that continue for as long as approval remains in effect, and consider whether accreditation is worth pursuing.
- Reviewing your current obligations before an inspection or an audit
- Assessing whether accredited sponsor status is available to you
- Advising on notifiable events and record-keeping requirements
- Responding where a sanction or a request for information has been raised
How standard business sponsorship approval works, step by step
Trading history, structure and financial position, checked against the approval requirements before anything is lodged.
Financial statements, employment records and the supporting material the application requires.
The standard business sponsorship application is lodged in ImmiAccount, as your authorised representative.
If the Department asks for more information, we handle the response within whatever timeframe is set.
On approval, the ongoing obligations set out below apply from that day, not from your first nomination.
Processing timeframes are set and published by the Department of Home Affairs and change without notice. We do not quote a processing time on this page — ask us for the current position at consultation.
The obligations that begin the day you are approved
Approval as a work sponsor is not a one-off event. Division 2.19 of the Migration Regulations 1994 imposes obligations that run for as long as the sponsorship remains in effect, including cooperating with Departmental inspectors, ensuring equivalent terms and conditions of employment, keeping records, notifying the Department of specified events, ensuring the sponsored person works only in the nominated occupation for you as the approved sponsor, and not recovering or passing on to the sponsored person certain costs associated with the sponsorship.
The obligation most often breached without intending to be
The sponsorship, nomination and any associated charges are the responsibility of your business. An arrangement under which the sponsored worker reimburses those costs, directly or through a reduction in salary, is a breach of the obligation rather than a private matter between the parties.
A failure to meet a sponsorship obligation carries real consequences: sanctions under section 140K of the Migration Act 1958, cancellation of your sponsorship approval or a bar on sponsoring under section 140M, and a civil penalty under section 140Q. None of that is a reason to avoid sponsorship. It is a reason to understand what you are agreeing to before you are bound by it.
Source: Migration Regulations 1994, Division 2.19, regulations 2.77 to 2.87C, compilation F2026C00667, compilation date 1 July 2026, Compilation No. 288. Migration Act 1958, sections 140K, 140M and 140Q, compilation C2026C00232, compilation date 4 June 2026, Compilation No. 171. Confirmed as the current compilations as at 16 September 2026 in an earlier draft on this topic (Business/website/drafts/PASTE-05); re-confirm currency before this page is relied upon.
Frequently asked questions
Employer How long does it take to become an approved sponsor?
Processing timeframes for standard business sponsorship applications are set and published by the Department of Home Affairs, and change without notice. We do not publish a fixed timeframe here because a published figure goes stale the moment the Department updates it — we give you the current position at consultation.
Employer Does becoming an approved sponsor mean our first nomination will be approved?
No. Sponsorship approval, nomination approval and the visa decision are three separate approvals made against three separate sets of criteria. Approval as a sponsor establishes that your business meets the threshold to hold sponsorship obligations; it does not itself say anything about a particular position or a particular worker.
Source: Migration Act 1958, sections 140E and 140GB, compilation C2026C00232, compilation date 4 June 2026.
Employer Can the sponsored worker pay any of the sponsorship costs?
No. One of the ongoing obligations imposed on an approved work sponsor by Division 2.19 of the Migration Regulations 1994 is not to recover, or transfer to another person, certain costs associated with the sponsorship, including the nomination and sponsorship charges. Passing those costs to the sponsored worker, whether directly or through salary arrangements, is a breach of that obligation.
Source: Migration Regulations 1994, Division 2.19, regulations 2.77 to 2.87C, compilation F2026C00667, 1 July 2026.
Employer What happens if we do not meet a sponsorship obligation?
The Migration Act 1958 provides for sanctions under section 140K, cancellation of your sponsorship approval or a bar on sponsoring under section 140M, and a civil penalty under section 140Q. What follows in a particular case depends on the facts and is a matter for the Department; no adviser can tell you in advance what it would decide.
Source: Migration Act 1958, sections 140K, 140M and 140Q, compilation C2026C00232, 4 June 2026.
Employer What is the difference between a standard business sponsor and an accredited sponsor?
Accredited sponsor status is a higher tier available to certain approved sponsors that meet additional requirements, and it carries advantages such as the ability to advertise a nominated position on the sponsor's own website for labour market testing purposes. The specific eligibility criteria for accreditation are confirmed against your business at consultation.
Flagged: the accreditation criteria referenced here have not been individually verified against a current instrument for this page. Do not rely on this answer without a /law-check pass.
Employer Can you guarantee our sponsorship application will be approved?
No, and no registered agent lawfully can. Sponsorship approval is decided by the Department of Home Affairs against the criteria in force at the time of decision. What we can do is assess your business accurately against those requirements, prepare the evidence properly, and tell you plainly where a risk exists before you commit any expenditure.
Talk to a registered migration agent before you apply
Australian Migration Co is a migration practice based in Perth. Adam Kocoglu is a Registered Migration Agent, MARN 2418576, and acts in employer sponsorship matters throughout Western Australia. We cannot tell you what a decision will be, and no registered agent will do so. We can set out what your business must satisfy, and where the risk lies, before you commit any expenditure.
Book a consultation See all sponsorship pathwaysWritten by Adam Kocoglu, Registered Migration Agent, MARN 2418576. Adam Kocoglu is the principal of Australian Migration Co, a registered migration agent in Perth, and acts for Western Australian employers in sponsorship, nomination and visa matters. Further information about Adam Kocoglu, migration agent Perth.
Information current at 22 September 2026. Migration law changes, and the instruments, regulations and figures referred to on this page are amended from time to time. This page is general information, not immigration assistance for your matter, and does not constitute or imply a guarantee of any outcome.