Student visa conditions, work limits and health cover basics

Your Student visa (subclass 500) lets you study in Australia, work part-time and travel in and out of the country [S2]. In return it comes with conditions. Breaking them can lead to your visa being cancelled, so it is worth knowing them before you arrive [S1].

Conditions you must keep

• Stay enrolled and keep up with your course. Meet your course requirements, remain enrolled, and maintain satisfactory attendance and course progress. Tell your provider if illness or other problems affect your attendance [S1].
• Give your provider your address. Tell your education provider your residential address within 7 days of arriving in Australia, and keep it up to date [S1].
• Keep health cover for your whole stay. You must hold Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC) for as long as you are in Australia on your student visa [S1] [S3].
• Check your grant letter. Your visa grant lists the conditions that apply to you and how long you can stay [S2].

Work limits

• While your course is in session: up to 48 hours per fortnight [S1] [S2].
• During scheduled course breaks: unlimited hours [S1].

Work that is a required part of your course, such as a placement listed in your course's CRICOS registration, is treated differently. Students who have started a master's by research or a doctorate have no work-hour limit. Breaking the work limit is a visa breach [S1] [S2].

Health cover (OSHC)

OSHC helps pay for medical care while you study. Basic OSHC generally covers [S3] [S4]:

• visits to a doctor (GP) and some specialist services
• some hospital treatment
• ambulance cover
• some prescription medicines

Basic OSHC usually does not cover dental, optical or physiotherapy unless the policy includes extras [S3].

MoHE scholarship students

Kuwait's Ministry of Higher Education provides health insurance for scholarship students through nib. The Kuwait Cultural Office tells students to activate their policy in the nib app on arrival. The nib cover KCO publishes includes some extras, such as dental and optical. Confirm the current limits with KCO [S5].

Before you apply

The visa application charge is currently from AUD 2,500 [S1]. Check the Home Affairs page for the fee that applies to you, because it can change [S2].