Which Body Does Skills Assessment For Engineers In Australia?

At a glance: Engineers Australia is the only government-authorised body that conducts migration skills assessments for engineers. If you're applying for a skilled visa as an engineer — 189, 190, 491, or an employer-sponsored pathway — a positive outcome from Engineers Australia is the document that unlocks everything else.

One Body, Four Occupational Categories

Engineers Australia doesn't just issue a yes-or-no letter — it places you into one of four occupational categories based on your qualification and skill level: Professional Engineer, Engineering Technologist, Engineering Associate, or Engineering Manager. Which category you land in determines your ANZSCO occupation code, and that code is what your entire visa application gets built around. Get the category wrong, and the mismatch can follow you all the way to a visa refusal.

The Two Pathways — And Why It's Not Your Choice to Make

Accredited Qualifications pathway. If your degree comes from a program accredited under the Washington Accord, Sydney Accord, Dublin Accord, or an equivalent Australian-accredited program, this route applies. It's largely document-based — no written competency portfolio required — and generally the faster of the two.

Competency Demonstration Report (CDR) pathway. If your qualification isn't accredited under one of those agreements, you'll need to write a CDR: three career episodes plus a summary statement demonstrating how your real engineering work meets Australian competency standards. This is where most applications go wrong — not because the engineering is weak, but because the writing doesn't map cleanly to the required competency elements.

Since 1 September 2024, Engineers Australia also tightened its rules for advanced diploma and associate degree holders — only qualifications it has specifically accredited now qualify under the Australian pathway, so it's worth checking your course against the current list before assuming you're covered.

What It Actually Costs You in Time

Processing currently runs at roughly 8–12 weeks for Accord-pathway applications and 10–16 weeks for CDR applications, with a priority option available for an extra fee that can bring this down to around 4–6 weeks. Fees themselves range from roughly AUD 270 to AUD 1,575 depending on pathway and any add-on services, with the usual small annual increase applied from 1 July.