Relocation Package - London to Melbourne - Help!

[mammaneedsadrink]

Hi all. I've had a look through existing threads, but can't seem to find what I'm looking for, so hoping someone can help!

My DH has been offered an internal transfer to Melbourne. He works for an American company in a fairly senior role and they want him to move there and set up and lead the Australian division. They don't have anyone employed there at the moment and most of their work is in the US so they don't have a standard relocation package. They've asked him to come up with the kind of package he'll be looking for and we're not sure what to ask for. They've also (insanely in my opinion) asked him to suggest a fair salary for over there, so thought I would ask here if anyone could give some insight.

So as not to drip feed, it would be me, DH and 2 DC (6 & 3). I would be leaving a mid senior role, giving up a salary of approx £50k. He is currently on a base salary of £100k, with his OTE another £100k on top. We currently live in Greater London and have a pretty standard 4 bed semi which we have a mortgage on. We have a fairly comfortable life here and I would want the same standard of living there. At the moment, I've come up with the following:

Relocation manager/company to help
2x return flights home a year for us all
All costs covered relating to the visa
Temporary rental accommodation for 2 months
Rental car for 2 months
School fees
Cost of shipping furniture

This seems quite a lot, so not sure if we're thinking too high and keen to understand what others might have received.

We have no idea what to ask for salary, but if we go just by converting currency, I'm thinking he asks for $190000 base, plus same commission deal.

Any help, guidance or advise would be much appreciated. TIA!

Make sure you don't have dual house costs and utilities, so costs at home and oz. If your renting your house then fine, but if your not renting it out you'll want company to pay for housing in oz!
Plus you can ask for....
Relocation allowance
Cost of living allowance
Housing allowance

I would actually handle this entirely differently OP.

Say you won’t do it yourself but ask for the services of a relocation consultant now to price the move. Given his level I’m pretty surprised they haven’t offered that.

There’s zero point in translating his UK salary. The new role needs to be sized and then locally benchmarked. Ask him to find out from his HR team who the firm uses for benchmarking and then ask them to do it for the role in Melbourne. That will also give an indication of market benefits. If they use a company that doesn’t have much of a presence in the Australian market, then don’t let them use them as the data will be crap. I think Willis Towers Watson and Mercer are still the biggest.

You shouldn’t be doing their job for them.

Whatever he does, don’t let them use an in-house US based relocation person - they have, in my experience, zero understanding of employment conditions and market norms outside of the US.

Seriously, you shouldn't be doing to running around on this one (but should have an appreciation, as you are working on). If the company want the job doing they need to know the territory and what they are asking. I'd be worried that the office setup would be too much on your husband's shoulders if they can't even be arsed to work out a relocation package for their main contact.

Yep, agree with every word of this. Work out for yourself where your boundaries are - what you’d accept - but it should be on them to do the work.

Absolutely! Why the hell are YOU being lumbered with all this? The whole thing sounds completely disorganised and unprofessional. I fear that your DH will get there and will get zero support with whatever the hell he's supposed to be doing. His company sound utterly clueless. They should be the ones figuring all this out, not the wife of the bloke they want to send!

I agree with @cheezncrackers and was coming back to post the same thing. As well as the benefits you need to know what support the company is going to give long term and they seem to be swerving that completely. Also, they are setting themselves up for failure - I used to work for a company that got big quite quickly and we spent years unpicking ridiculous international assignment agreements in an effort to standardise the process. It all got wildly unfair as each agreement was based on what you could wrangle out of your business lead!

Thanks for the comments, they're very helpful, thank you!

Slight update, he asked me to look into this whilst he was away (on a totally different time zone) so we're communicating via text. He's now home and told me that the company is in process of engaging with a relocation consultant, but they have also asked him to come up with what his expectations would be, so I'm a bit happier with this now. Seems they are doing their bit and it's more for us to work out what our boundaries would be, like PP have said.

I'm getting way ahead of myself and ridiculously excited, which I know I shouldn't for now. Does anyone know how long the visa process takes? Could we realistically be there this year?

They have changed all the visa categories since we moved so I don’t know what they now call the old 457 which was the work visa most large companies would bring their employees on. They used to be fairly fast, like within a few months. It is crucial to check if the old rule of having 30 days to leave the country if you lose your job and can’t find another company who can take over your sponsorship quickly is still in force. We know more than one family who had to up sticks and leave and not everyone’s contract covered relocation home. A few people were offered new jobs but the companies weren’t eligible to sponsor. Personally I would have your own immigration lawyer check any contract, I know that sounds like overkill but Australian immigration is not easy. It took us 18 months to get Permanent Residence off the Occupation in Demand list because we didn’t want to risk moving three kids to Aus without certainty.

There is an Aussie Board here https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/aussie-nz-mumsnetters .
I think the time of the golden packages is gone, but a good relocations would include:

• One flight, not two, ask for business flight and you use your points for the second.
• All costs related to the move is better wording than shipping and visa costs, this includes immigration agent, visa fee, shipping, customs, furniture assembling
• 2 months in serviced apartment / AirBnb
• first year of rental
• car allowance (usually 20.000 a year and you decide if you want to buy a car or not)
• school fees
• health insurance (you have no choice, it is compulsory) . It will include dental.

Our visas were quick, 4 months. Your stuff can't be shipped until you have landed, so you will be here for a couple of months until your stuff arrives, this is why you need a serviced apartment, since almost all rentals are empty.

I would start at AUD 250.000 and you need to be aware that bonuses are heavily taxed.
Australia is very expensive, especially if you buy fresh food. My first supermarket trip was a shock. Most rentals don't have solar, so your energy bills will be high. Entertainment (eating out, theatre, ...) is expensive .
You will probably need two cars, and cars are more expensive.

Well to make it simpler. Australia is expensive .

Hi I work in HR Management position for my corporation, we need to arrange for relocation packages for our colleagues all the time. What relocation company charges is way to high, It is so much cheaper to:

1. handle the visa by yourself, it's actually not that difficult
2. get flight tickets
3. find an Airbnb and then look for a long-term accommodation after settling in

In terms of moving company, our company always quotes at least 3 company, but ends up using Transworld Relocation all the time, they are very cost effective, and provides full packing services. They have offices globally, moving from Melbourne to UK should cost you around £300-£500 only depending how much you are moving.

https://www.transworldrelocation.com/