PIC 4020: false or misleading information, bogus documents, and the bars that follow

MARN 1576536

What the criterion says

An applicant must satisfy the Department that there is no evidence that they have given, or caused to be given, a bogus document or information that is false or misleading in a material particular, in the current application or in relation to a visa they held in the twelve months before it. They must also satisfy the Department of their identity, and that they have not been refused a visa under the criterion in the previous three years, or on identity in the previous ten. Three separate ideas sit inside it: the document or statement itself, the bar that follows a refusal, and the waiver that can lift the shorter bar.

Which visas carry it

The criterion is written into the requirements of most skilled, employer-sponsored, student, visitor, business and temporary visas, and it applies to every applicant on the application, including family members. Whether a particular subclass carries it is a matter of the Regulations for that subclass, which is the first thing checked when the letter arrives, because a bar under 4020 only bites on later applications for visas that also carry it.

Bogus documents

A document is bogus where the Department reasonably suspects it is counterfeit, has been altered without authority, or was obtained on the strength of a false or misleading statement. The test is the Department's reasonable suspicion, and it does not ask whether the applicant knew. That is why the common pattern, a reference letter written by an employer who overstated the role, a certificate bought by a relative, an agent who filled a gap in the file, lands on the applicant. What the response can do is show how the document came into the application, what the true facts are, and why the suspicion should not be held or should not be treated as the applicant's doing. It cannot make a bogus document genuine.

False or misleading information

Information is caught where it is untrue or misleading in a material particular, meaning it matters to the decision, and where it was given with a purpose to mislead rather than by innocent mistake. The courts have drawn that line, and it is the line most responses turn on. An employment date out by a month, corrected once noticed, is not the criterion. A year of employment that did not happen is. The response has to show, with evidence, which side of the line the statement falls on, and it has to do that without creating a second inconsistency.

The bars

• Three years from a refusal for a bogus document or false or misleading information, for any later application that carries the criterion.
• Ten years where the Department was not satisfied of the applicant's identity. No waiver.
• Family members included in the refused application carry the same bar, because the criterion applied to them too.
• A visa already held that was obtained with the same information is exposed to cancellation on its own grounds, separately from the refusal.

The bar runs from the refusal, so the timing of a withdrawal, where withdrawal is the right call, decides whether a refusal under the criterion ever exists.

The letter

Before refusing under 4020 the Department must put the adverse information to you and give you a chance to comment, under section 57 of the Act. The letter names the document or statement, says why it is doubted, and gives a response date. Everything about the response goes on the file permanently: a concession made to seem cooperative, an explanation that contradicts the original form, a new document that raises its own questions. The letter is also where the waiver, if it is to be argued, has to be argued. How the response is built is in the natural justice letter guide.

The waiver

The three-year bar, and the criterion itself in the current application, can be waived where there are compelling circumstances that affect the interests of Australia, or compassionate or compelling circumstances that affect the interests of an Australian citizen, permanent resident or eligible New Zealand citizen. In practice that means an Australian partner or child whose circumstances are affected, or an employer or project whose loss is a loss to Australia, shown with evidence rather than asserted. Hardship to the applicant alone is not the test. The identity limb has no waiver at all.

What to do first

• Note the response date on the letter. It can be extended on request in some circumstances; it does not extend itself.
• Do not reply by return email, and do not send more documents until the ones already lodged have been read against the allegation.
• Gather the original source of the doubted document or statement: who produced it, when, from what.
• Decide, with advice, between answering, withdrawing, and answering with a waiver argument. They lead to different places.
• If an agent prepared the application, have the file reviewed by someone else before the response goes in.

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General information only, current at October 2026; not advice on your own case. Public Interest Criterion 4020, Schedule 4 of the Migration Regulations 1994, and sections 5 and 57 of the Migration Act 1958, as in force at the date above. Outcomes depend on the Department’s assessment of each application; no registered migration agent can guarantee a result (Code of Conduct, Migration Agents Regulations). Keshab Chapagain, MARN 1576536.