Sponsored work · Costs and deductions
Can my sponsor deduct visa costs from my pay? What a sponsor cannot recover, and what to do
A sponsored worker who sees the nomination fee, the training levy or the agent’s bill come out of their wages, or who signs a contract that makes them repay it all if they leave, is looking at a breach of the sponsor’s obligations, not a term of employment. The regulations put the costs of sponsoring and nominating on the sponsor, and prohibit recovering them from anyone. Some costs are the worker’s own, and an employer who advanced them stands differently. Deductions for accommodation and the like are governed by the Fair Work Act, with its own test. And a demand for money in return for sponsorship is a crime for both sides. This guide draws the lines, and sets out how a worker raises it without losing the visa.
By Keshab Chapagain, registered migration agent (MARN 1576536) since 2015 · WIDEN, Sydney · Reviewed October 2026
Keshab Chapagain · MARN 1576536 · Registered since 2015 - Sponsor bears
- SBS and nomination charges, SAF levy, sponsorship agent fees, recruitment
- Cannot be
- Recovered, transferred, deducted, or clawed back
- Worker’s own
- Visa charge, medicals, police checks, English, skills assessment
- Deductions
- Written authority, employee’s benefit, reasonable
- Paying for sponsorship
- Criminal offence, both sides
- Reporting
- Assurance Protocol; Workplace Justice visa
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Bring the contract and three payslips. Thirty minutes tells you what is recoverable, what is not, and the order to raise it in.
In the consultation I read the employment contract, any repayment clause and the deductions against the sponsor obligations and the Fair Work rules, tell you which amounts the sponsor cannot recover and which it can, and set out how to raise it, with the employer, the Ombudsman or the Department, in a sequence that keeps your visa and your position for the next one. Confidential; the sponsor is not told.
What it costs. $330 inc. GST for 30 minutes by video with Keshab Chapagain (MARN 1576536), credited in full against our professional fee if you engage WIDEN. Advice confirmed in writing after the session.
The costs a sponsor must bear
A standard business sponsor is bound by the sponsorship obligations in the Migration Regulations, and one of them is the obligation not to recover, transfer or take any action that would result in another person paying the costs of the sponsorship and nomination. The costs it covers are the sponsorship application charge, the nomination application charge, the Skilling Australians Fund levy paid with each nomination, the fees of a migration agent or lawyer for the sponsorship and nomination applications, and the costs of recruiting the worker, including recruitment agency fees. The obligation applies from the day the sponsorship is approved and for a period after the worker ceases to be sponsored, and it applies however the recovery is dressed: a wage deduction, a lump-sum repayment, a reduced starting salary that nets the amounts off, a loan agreement, or a payment to a related company. A sponsor found to have recovered these costs faces a sanction, from an administrative warning through an infringement notice to being barred from sponsoring, and the amounts can be ordered repaid. The obligations guide sets out the full list.
The costs that are the worker's
The visa application charge for the worker and any family, the health examinations, the police certificates, the English test, the skills assessment where one is required, and the fees of an agent for the worker's own visa application are the worker's costs under the regulations. Nothing stops an employer from paying them, and many do as a term of the offer. An employer who pays them and asks for them back is not recovering sponsorship costs, and the question becomes one of contract and the Fair Work Act: was the payment a genuine advance, is the repayment term reasonable, and does it operate as a penalty. A worker asked to meet their own costs is not being exploited; a worker asked to meet the sponsor's is. The fee schedule on this site shows which side each charge falls on: visa fees.
Repayment clauses
A clause requiring the worker to repay sponsorship costs if they resign within a period is common, and in respect of the sponsor-side costs it is a breach of the obligation in its own right. The Department's position is that the obligation is breached by the attempt to recover, not only by the recovery; a contract that provides for repayment of the nomination fee, the levy or the sponsorship agent's fees is a breach from signature, and the worker is not bound to pay. In respect of worker-side costs the employer advanced, a repayment clause may be enforceable if it is proportionate, reduces over time, and reflects a real advance rather than a device to hold the worker. A worker deciding whether to leave reads the clause with that distinction in mind, and the 180-day guide covers the visa side of leaving.
Deductions for accommodation, transport and tools
Deductions from wages are governed by the Fair Work Act, which permits a deduction only where the employee has authorised it in writing and it is principally for the employee's benefit, or where an award, enterprise agreement, court order or law permits it, and which makes a deduction unlawful if it is unreasonable in the circumstances, or if it is for the benefit of the employer or a related party beyond the actual cost, or if it is required by a term that is itself unreasonable. Rent for accommodation at or below market rate, chosen by the worker and authorised in writing, can be lawful; rent above market, accommodation the worker could not refuse, charges for transport the worker was required to use, or the cost of tools and uniforms the employer requires are the usual unlawful ones. The Fair Work Ombudsman investigates and recovers; the Department treats a pattern of unlawful deductions from a sponsored worker as evidence against the sponsor's equivalent-terms obligation.
Salary offsets and the market rate
A sponsor must pay the nominated salary, which must be no less than the annual market salary rate for the position and no less than the income threshold for the stream, and must provide terms and conditions no less favourable than an Australian in the same role. A salary set lower than the market rate to absorb sponsorship costs breaches the nomination; a salary that meets the rate on paper but is reduced by deductions that return money to the employer breaches it in substance, and the Department reads payslips and bank records when monitoring. A worker whose take-home pay, after deductions the employer controls, falls below what the nomination promised has grounds to raise it, and the nomination documents are the measure. The 482 guide sets out the thresholds.
Paying for sponsorship
Since 2015 it has been a criminal offence to ask for, receive, offer or provide a benefit in return for a sponsorship-related event: the approval of a sponsorship, a nomination, the employment that supports the visa, or a decision not to withdraw them. The offence catches the employer who asks, the worker who pays, the intermediary who arranges it, and the relative who provides the money, and the penalties include imprisonment and substantial fines. A visa holder who provided a benefit is also exposed to cancellation of the visa, with a discretion that weighs whether they were coerced. The legitimate costs above are excluded; a payment of the worker's own visa charge is not a benefit for sponsorship. A demand for money, a deposit, a share of wages returned in cash, or a price for the nomination is, and it is reported rather than paid.
The employer-compliance offences
Amendments that commenced in 2024 added offences for an employer who uses a person's migration status to coerce or unduly influence them to accept a work arrangement that breaches their visa conditions or to work in breach of workplace law, created prohibition notices that bar a named employer from employing further temporary visa holders, and published a register of prohibited employers. An employer who tells a sponsored worker that the visa will be withdrawn unless they accept a deduction, work unpaid hours or repay a cost is within the new offences, and the evidence of the threat, in a message or an email, is what the Department and the Ombudsman act on.
Reporting without losing the visa
The worker's fear is that reporting the sponsor ends the sponsorship and the visa with it, and the fear is reasonable; a sponsor who is barred cannot keep sponsoring. Two protections exist. Under the Assurance Protocol between the Department and the Fair Work Ombudsman, a temporary visa holder who reports exploitation and has breached a work-related condition only as a result of it will generally not have the visa cancelled for that breach, provided they seek help, cooperate, and commit to complying in future. The Workplace Justice visa, a short-term visa introduced for exploited workers, allows a worker who has left the employer to remain in Australia while they pursue a claim through the Ombudsman, a court or another body, with work rights, so that the claim does not die with the departure. Neither protection restores a sponsorship; the next visa is a separate plan, made before the report where possible, and the order of events, new sponsor found, report made, claim lodged, is the thing the consultation sequences.
What to do
- Keep every payslip, the contract, the offer letter, and any message about the costs or the deductions.
- Identify each amount: sponsor-side, worker-side, or a Fair Work deduction, using the lines above.
- Do not sign a repayment agreement or a new authority while the question is open, and do not pay a demand for sponsorship.
- Decide the sequence: raise it with the employer in writing, report to the Ombudsman, report to the Department, or all three, and in which order, with the next visa in view.
- Keep working and keep the visa conditions, because the protections apply to breaches caused by the exploitation, not to breaches chosen in response to it.
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General information only, current at October 2026; not advice on your own case. Division 2.19 of the Migration Regulations 1994 (sponsorship obligations, including the obligation not to recover certain costs), sections 245AQ to 245AS of the Migration Act 1958 (benefits for sponsorship-related events), the employer-compliance amendments of 2024, and sections 323 to 326 of the Fair Work Act 2009, as in force at the date above. Employment-law remedies are a matter for the Fair Work Ombudsman or an employment lawyer; WIDEN advises on the migration side. Outcomes depend on the Department’s assessment of each matter; no registered migration agent can guarantee a result (Code of Conduct, Migration Agents Regulations). Keshab Chapagain, MARN 1576536.
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My employer is taking the visa costs out of my wages. Is that legal?
Not for the sponsorship-side costs. A standard business sponsor is under an obligation not to recover, transfer or seek to recover from the worker or anyone else the costs of becoming a sponsor and of nominating: the sponsorship and nomination application charges, the Skilling Australians Fund levy, the migration agent's fees for those applications, and the costs of recruiting the worker. A deduction, a repayment, a reduced salary to offset them, or a side payment are each a breach of that obligation, and the sponsor is the one sanctioned.
What can I be asked to pay myself?
Your own visa application charge, your health examinations, police certificates, English test, skills assessment, and the migration agent's fees for your visa application, as distinct from the sponsor's. Many employers choose to pay some of these, but they are the worker's costs under the regulations. An employer who pays them and later seeks to claw them back is in a different position from one recovering sponsorship costs, and the clause is examined on its terms.
My contract says I repay the sponsorship costs if I leave within two years. Can they enforce that?
A clause requiring repayment of the sponsor's own costs, the nomination fee, the levy, the agent's fees for the sponsorship, is a recovery of costs the sponsor is prohibited from recovering, and the Department treats it as a breach whether or not it is ever enforced. A clause requiring repayment of costs that were legitimately the worker's, where the employer advanced them, is closer to the line and depends on whether it is a genuine advance, reasonable, and not a penalty. The safe reading for a worker is that the sponsorship-side amounts are not recoverable, and the worker-side amounts may be.
They deduct rent for accommodation they provide. Is that allowed?
A deduction from wages is lawful under the Fair Work Act only if it is authorised in writing by the employee and principally for the employee's benefit, or permitted by an award, enterprise agreement, court order or law, and a deduction is unlawful if it is unreasonable in the circumstances or directly or indirectly benefits the employer beyond the cost. Rent at a market rate for accommodation the worker chose, authorised in writing, can be lawful; rent above market, or for accommodation the worker had no real choice about, is not. The worker's pay after lawful deductions must still meet the nominated salary and the market rate.
My employer asked me to pay for the sponsorship. What is that?
A criminal offence, for both sides. Asking for, receiving, offering or providing a benefit in return for a sponsorship-related event, the sponsorship, the nomination, or the employment that supports it, is an offence under the Migration Act with imprisonment and fines, and a visa holder who provided the benefit is also exposed to visa cancellation. The exception is the worker's own legitimate costs. A demand for money in return for being sponsored is reported, not paid.
If I report, will I lose my visa?
The Assurance Protocol between the Department and the Fair Work Ombudsman means a temporary visa holder who reports workplace exploitation, and who has breached a work-related visa condition only because of it, will generally not have the visa cancelled for that breach, provided they cooperate. The Workplace Justice visa allows a worker who has left an exploitative employer to stay while a claim is pursued. Neither protects a worker who did nothing to report. The consultation sets out the sequence, because the order of events matters.
What does the consultation cost?
A$330 inc. GST for 30 minutes by video with Keshab Chapagain (MARN 1576536), credited in full if you engage WIDEN. For a deduction or repayment question the session reads the contract and the payslips against the obligation, and tells you what is recoverable, what is not, and what to do about it without putting the visa at risk.
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