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Recognition of Australian and New Zealand Licences

If you are currently licensed or registered as a conveyancer (or equivalent) elsewhere in Australia or New Zealand, you are eligible to apply for a full/unrestricted Victorian conveyancers licence. For details on how to apply please go to the Application Forms page.

Once your New Zealand or other Australian state licence is recognised with the granting of a Victorian Conveyancer's licence, Victorian law regulates how you must carry on your business in Victoria.

Eligibility

You must currently hold an equivalent licence/registration in another Australian State, Territory, or in New Zealand.

Professional Indemnity Insurance

In order to carry on business as a conveyancer in Victoria you need to be covered by the appropriate prescribed Victorian Professional Indemnity Insurance, otherwise your licence will be suspended for any period you are not covered by that insurance. 

Disqualification

If you become a disqualified person you are no longer eligible to hold a licence and must notify the BLA. 

You are a disqualified person if you are:

• insolvent under administration (bankrupt) or a director of a company under external administration
• a disqualified person under the Legal Profession Act 2004
• the subject of an order by any regulatory body disqualifying you from acting as a conveyancer
• a represented person under the Guardianship and Administration Act 1986 (where a guardian or administrator has been appointed)

You are a disqualified person but you can apply for permission to continue to hold a licence if:

• within the last 10 years, you have been found guilty of, or convicted for an offence involving fraud, dishonesty, drug trafficking or violence which is punishable by imprisonment for three months or more (whether or not a sentence of imprisonment was imposed)
• you have had a claim admitted against you from the Victorian Property Fund.

If either or both of these factors apply, you can still apply for permission to continue to hold a licence. 

In determining whether or not to grant permission the BLA will consider among other things, the type of offence or claim, the events and circumstances that led up to the offence or claim and whether it would be contrary to public interest to grant the licence.