Immigration adviser Ying Tian has had her licence cancelled following a recent case in which she was found to have been "frequently dishonest". Photo / Immigration NZ
Immigration adviser Ying Tian has had her licence cancelled following a recent case in which she was found to have been "frequently dishonest". Photo / Immigration NZ
A "frequently dishonest" immigration adviser who pretended to work for a client but instead did nothing has had her licence cancelled.
It's the fourth black mark against Ying Tian (aka Tina Qin) who has now left a young Chinese national faced with having to return home, to try his luckagain on getting back to New Zealand.
The student and his mother, neither of whom can be identified, went to Tian for help with his immigration status. For a long time she pretended to act for him but instead, "deliberately misled him", the Immigration Advisers Complaints and Disciplinary Tribunal said in yesterday's decision.
The man suffered significant losses, including what he described as being robbed of critical years of his life waiting for the student visa he thought was in train.
He also lost a $21,000 enrolment fee to a polytechnic which terminated his place on the course and didn't refund the money when it was discovered he did not have a student visa.
Tian has now been banned from reapplying for a professional licence for the maximum time of two years, and will be $35,000 out of pocket in fines and compensation.
Immigration lawyer Ramya Sathiyanathan said immigration advisers who deceived clients were toying with the lives of migrants. Photo / Supplied
Specialist immigration lawyer Ramya Sathiyanathan who acted for the man, told Open Justice that the situation was all too common in the immigration space, and the impacts were significant.
She said tribunal decisions like this should hopefully act as a deterrent for other such immigration professionals who were "toying with the lives of migrants".
Tian's conduct was found to have been "deliberately misleading and dishonest" over a prolonged period. It comes almost two years after her licence was suspended in relation to an earlier complaint, and was the fourth complaint upheld against her for unprofessional conduct.
Tian was tearful when she told Open Justice she was not sure if she would reapply for another licence in future, but that she had made a "stupid mistake".
Tian was a licensed immigration adviser and director of Auckland based Abstract Solution. The man who laid the complaint had arrived in New Zealand in 2014, then aged 18.
Following a number of successful student and visitor visa applications, a student visa application lodged in October 2016 was unsuccessful. Tian did not inform the complainant it had been declined. She then lodged student visa applications under the special case category, from November 2016 until March 2017.
This was done without instructions from the man or his mother and without telling them of the outcome of any application.
In June 2017 Tian filed an expression of interest on his and his mother's behalf, and for two others, seeking residence. Immigration New Zealand advised that it would not issue an invitation to apply for residence, but Tian did not inform the man of this.
Nor did she make any further applications or requests to INZ, yet she led the man and his mother to believe there was a live application before the government agency.
"Ms Tian maintained this façade until about January 2021 when the complainant found out from Immigration NZ his actual immigration status," the tribunal said.
It found that along with 16 code breaches, Tian had been dishonest on eight separate occasions, including that she falsely advised the man's mother in March 2019 that she would solve her fear that she and the complainant were on Immigration NZ's blacklist.
"She was consciously leading the complainant to believe that there was an extant application before Immigration NZ," the tribunal said.
Tian accepted responsibility for the mistakes, but otherwise offered the tribunal no further comment. She later agreed on "all the penalty I need to take" and apologised for her past behaviour.
She said she never intended to behave the way she did, but it was out of her control sometimes. Despite a statement she was being treated by a psychologist, Tian provided no such evidence to the tribunal.
Ramya Sathiyanathan, told Open Justice that the significance of immigration decisions and the consequences for each client and their family was immense.
"Whilst this matter was a success for our client, his lost time can never be reinstated."
In deciding on penalties, the tribunal found misconduct that was "particularly serious". Tian was censured, as a caution alone would not reflect the tribunal's disapproval of her conduct.
An immigration lawyer said advisers who deceived clients were "toying with the lives" of migrants. Photo / 123RF
Cancellation of a licence was seen as a sanction of last resort, but given the circumstances of the complaint, and with regard to Tian's record, her "attitude to clients and to the disciplinary process", the tribunal felt that cancellation of her licence was an appropriate step.
"There is no evidence the retraining directed in the earlier sanctions decisions has remedied her lack of professionalism.
"Cancellation is appropriate, not just to protect the public, but also to punish Ms Tian for her wrongdoing."
In order to protect the public for as long as the statute permitted, Tian could not reapply for any licence for the maximum period of two years.
Compensation of $27,000 was ordered to cover the loss of the polytechnic enrolment fee, plus a $1150 immigration consultancy fee and $5000 for emotional distress. She was also fined $8000.
The tribunal said that while Tian had been deceitful for a prolonged period there was no evidence that the complainant had good prospects of staying in New Zealand beyond the period for which the visa had been sought in October 2016.
The tribunal said the proper course of action now would be for him to depart New Zealand and seek a new visa from offshore.
