VisaAustralia protection reviews now require A$1,863.50 upfront: check exemptions
The tribunal’s 1 November change affects new protection-review applications, including unfinished online drafts. Existing pre-November applications follow different fee arrangements.
Official source date: 2026-11-01
Edited and checked by the VisaWand editorial team
The payment point changes from 1 November
Australia’s Administrative Review Tribunal announced on 1 November 2026 that most applicants seeking review of a protection-visa refusal or cancellation must now pay A$1,863.50 upfront. The change concerns access to the review process, rather than the price of a fresh protection-visa application or a new nationality-specific eligibility rule.
The tribunal’s announcement also addresses unfinished online forms: a draft not submitted before midnight AEDT at the start of Sunday 1 November must be restarted under the new arrangements, with payment before submission. Saving a draft before commencement is therefore different from lodging the review. Anyone relying on an earlier session should check whether the tribunal actually received the application, rather than assuming that an account reference or saved screen establishes timely lodgement.
Identify the exemption before arranging payment
The tribunal’s Fees resource says the upfront fee applies to protection refusals and cancellations and to relevant decisions that a protection finding would no longer be made under section 197D of the Migration Act. It lists exemptions for a non-citizen in immigration detention and for an application combined with another application for which the prescribed fee has already been paid.
The tribunal cannot reduce or waive the protection-review fee through its financial-hardship arrangements. Those arrangements described elsewhere on the same website concern other review categories and should not be assumed to provide an alternative in this case. Establish the actual decision type and whether a stated exemption applies before payment. An inability to pay is practically serious, but it does not by itself establish an extension of the filing deadline or a further exemption.
The decision letter remains essential for the filing deadline
The protection section of the tribunal’s Immigration and Citizenship guide says time limits depend on the decision and whether the person is detained. It directs applicants to the Home Affairs decision letter and says the tribunal has no power to extend the review deadline. There is consequently no single safe number of days that this article can assign to every affected person.
The guide asks applicants to provide the decision letter, a valid email address, payment details where applicable and the information identifying the decision and person concerned. It links to the online application and the R1 refugee-review form for applicants unable to apply online. Use the protection section, rather than a general migration or character-review checklist. If review was already referred to the tribunal according to the decision letter, the guide says a separate application is unnecessary; confirm that precise situation before duplicating a case.
The regulation distinguishes refunds from fee reductions
The Migration Amendment (2026 Measures No. 1) Regulations 2026 were made on 29 October and commence on 1 November. The amended regulation sets the protection-review fee at half the indexed general migration-review fee and expressly requires the prescribed fee to accompany the application. Its specified exemptions correspond to the detention and combined-application situations described by the tribunal.
The regulation separately provides for full refunds in defined outcomes, including where the person is not entitled to apply, the decision is not reviewable, or the tribunal varies, remits or substitutes the decision in the specified way. A possible later refund is not permission to withhold an amount due when applying. Nor does payment establish that the tribunal has jurisdiction or that the protection claim will succeed. Use the legislative resource to understand the framework and the tribunal guidance for the practical payment procedure.
Existing applications and immediate next steps
For protection reviews lodged before 1 November, the Fees resource preserves different arrangements: no upfront payment was required, but an unsuccessful review can attract a later fee. If invoiced under those arrangements, payment is required within seven days. Do not apply the new upfront rule retrospectively to a properly lodged older case merely because its hearing or outcome occurs later.
The immediate sequence for a new applicant is to locate the decision and notification records, establish the exact deadline, check any exemption and complete the review with the required payment. Keep both the application acknowledgement and payment evidence. Where a saved draft must be restarted, allow time to transfer accurate information instead of treating an incomplete form as protection against expiry. Seek the tribunal’s procedural help promptly if the application route or decision category is unclear; a pending enquiry does not change the stated filing limit.
