You've chosen where you're studying. Make sure the visa matches.
Full-time study at a New Zealand school, polytechnic, or university as an international student.
The basics
A temporary student visa from Immigration New Zealand for people paying tuition to an approved NZ education provider — granted for the duration of the course, with conditional work rights.
Purpose
The most common student visa category in NZ. For people paying tuition to an approved NZ education provider.
Length of stay
Aligned to the length of the course and the validity of the applicant's passport. Can be granted for up to several years.
Work rights
Conditional — depend on age, type of course, and the conditions on the visa. Does not permit unrestricted work or self-employment.
Entry
Generally allows multi-entry travel in and out of NZ for the visa duration.
Residency pathway
Not a residence pathway on its own. The Post-Study Work Visa is a separate downstream product with its own criteria.
Support family
Partners and dependent children are not covered. They apply separately — see Partnership Work Visa and Dependent Child Student Visa.
Not sure if Fee Paying is the right student visa?There are several student visa categories — Fee Paying, Exchange, Pathway, Dependent Child, Foreign Government Supported. Talk to us so the right one is in play.
You have chosen where you want to study, and the course is real to you already — the first semester timetable, the campus you will walk into, the degree you will finish.
When our help makes a difference
Some immigration processes are approved without much friction. Some situations carry real risk of delay, hard pushback or decline.
Real cases · Illustrative
Every case is different. These are illustrative and don't guarantee a particular outcome.
Avoidable problems
Visitor Visa applications can be declined or delayed for reasons that are sometimes avoidable with better preparation.
Weak ties to a home country, inconsistent travel history, or vague explanations of the purpose of a visit can raise concerns. A well-prepared application addresses these points directly with supporting evidence.
Bare-minimum bank balances, unclear income sources, or missing sponsorship documentation can lead to requests for further information or decline.
Applicants from countries without a low TB incidence may need a chest X-ray. Those with criminal history may need police certificates. Out-of-date evidence delays processing.
Your passport must be valid for at least three months beyond your planned departure date. Travelling on a passport close to expiry can result in being refused boarding or refused entry at the border.
Providing false, misleading, or incomplete information — even unintentionally — can result in decline, and may affect future visa applications.
Applying too close to your intended travel date, or failing to apply for an extension before your current visa expires, creates complications that are difficult to resolve.
Important constraints
The Fee Paying Student Visa is a study visa. If your plans go beyond that — unrestricted work, residence, family inclusion — a different visa applies.
Not permitted
Lodging under the wrong visa wastes time and money. We'll tell you up front if a different pathway fits your situation better.
Work without restriction in NZ
Work rights are conditional and depend on age, course level, and the conditions on the visa.
Operate a business or be self-employed
Self-employment is not permitted on this visa.
Include a partner on the same visa
Partner applies separately. See Partnership Work Visa.
Include a dependent child on the same visa
Dependent children apply separately. See Dependent Child Student Visa.
Move to NZ permanently on this visa
Not a residence pathway. The Post-Study Work Visa is a separate downstream product; residence pathways apply later.
Find the right pathway
If a different immigration process fits your situation, we can take you there directly.
Working with us
We will guide you step by step on your Fee Paying Student Visa process, from start to finish.
Short email discussion to understand the course, the provider, your funds and sponsor situation, and any prior visa history. We'll tell you up front whether the Fee Paying Student Visa is the right pathway.
Letter of engagement signed, invoice paid. We open the file and map the timeline against the course start date and any current visa expiry.
We work through course confirmation, funds evidence (with sponsor documentation where relevant), genuine intentions context, and any prior-refusal handling — so the application reads as one coherent file.
We file the application on your behalf and confirm receipt with Immigration New Zealand.
If INZ requests further information mid-process, we draft the response with you — promptly, in the right form.
We walk you through the outcome. If granted, we explain the conditions, including work-rights limits and study restrictions. If declined, we work through reasons and your realistic options.
FAQ
In our experience, applications rarely fail on a single issue. They tend to encounter difficulty when several smaller concerns cluster together — credibility of funds evidence, gaps in the genuine-intent picture, missing triggers for medical or police certificates, or an undeclared element from a previous application. Policy settings also change from time to time, and files that were sound against the previous rules can look thinner against current ones. Part of the value of legal preparation is identifying these pressure points before lodgement rather than responding to them after the case officer has raised them.
Yes. Overseas family sponsorship is common on Fee Paying Student Visa files and it generally needs more careful preparation than funds held directly in the applicant’s own account. Immigration New Zealand looks at funds as a credibility question, which means the source, the holder, and the path of the money all matter — not just the amount visible on a statement. We help structure the evidence around those questions, including the preparation of a Financial Undertaking from the sponsor and supporting material that traces income back to identifiable sources. We cannot promise any particular outcome, but we can help ensure the funds element is presented coherently rather than piecemeal.
Lodging a further Fee Paying Student Visa application from within New Zealand when the current visa is nearing expiry is a common source of anxiety. Where the application is lodged in time and the applicant’s status meets the relevant conditions, an interim visa may become available while the substantive decision is made. The sequencing needs to be clean — a late lodgement or a gap in lawful status changes the options significantly, and in some scenarios a separate request to Immigration New Zealand may be required. We manage the timing so the risk of a status gap is contained as far as possible.
Requests for further information, and in more serious cases Potentially Prejudicial Information letters, are a normal part of the process on more complex files. A well-handled response is usually the point where the file is strengthened rather than weakened — it is an opportunity to address the case officer’s specific concern directly. We prepare and submit the response on your behalf, with attention to what the officer has actually asked rather than restating material already on file.
A prior refusal or a character issue does not automatically prevent a Fee Paying Student Visa being granted, but it does change how the file should be built. Both usually require careful disclosure with supporting context — what happened, what has changed since, and why the current application should be assessed on its own facts. Omitting or understating a prior matter, even unintentionally, can be treated as misrepresentation and affect future applications, which is why these elements are generally better addressed directly than left to be raised by the case officer. We work through the history with you and prepare the disclosure material so the point is presented in context rather than in isolation.
Whether your immigration process is straightforward or involves complicating factors, we can help you understand your options and put your best case forward.
MyLaw is a New Zealand law firm with a focus on immigration law.
Our team is led by Michael Yoon, a New Zealand lawyer and member of the New Zealand Law Society.
He holds a current practising certificate and works across a range of immigration matters, from Fee Paying Student Visa matters to complex cases involving prior refusals, character issues, and multi-visa strategies.
If you are preparing a Fee Paying Student Visa application, or your situation during study has changed, we are happy to talk it through. We work with straightforward files and with ones that have become more complicated along the way.
