关于买卖OFFER的事情在新西兰已经是老生常谈了，没有人会惊讶，也没有人会去反对。因为这是个正常的供需关系，这样的潜规则大家也心照不宣（只要提供的是真实工作）。但是就是有那么些Fuck SB鸟KIWI，没事找事……下面原文，大家自己看吧。可怜那位留学生了～

Dermot Nottingham was buying alcohol from his local liquor store in Onehunga, Auckland, when he was drawn into an immigration scam that would occupy eight months of his life.Nottingham had come to know the duty manager, Krishna Kumar Pusarla, known as KK, quite well, often haggling over the price of his more expensive whiskey.

One day in February, KK, a permanent New Zealand resident from India, had another deal in mind. He outlined an immigration scheme whereby employers, like Nottingham, who were willing to make false job offers to Asian students wanting permanent residency, could make a great deal of money. “He took me to the side of the liquor store. In the initial conversation he explained that I’d be paid $10,000 to write one letter a false job offer. Real easy, ten grand.

“Of course I was intrigued, I thought I’ll see what else he’s got to say. That night I rang up my brother and explained to him the situation, we decided to investigate it further and see if we could get to the Mr Big. In the initial conversation it was apparent that KK wasn’t the main man.”

Nottingham, aged 44 and a 185cm tall, 135kg bear of a man, has been a controversial character and has had his own brushes with the law.

In the late 90s he and his brother Philip took on the used car import industry, becoming self-styled justice campaigners and whistleblowers, exposing odometer-tampering. He later chronicled their endeavours in a book Car Wars.

He became an advocate, representing people attempting to take civil action against the state, including Raewyn Wallace, mother of Steven Wallace, shot by police in 2000.

At the time he began investigating this immigration scam, he was running a string of companies from his offices in Onehunga, doing property development and real estate on the side.

Nottingham thought he was the right man to infiltrate the scam.

“I had to think very carefully before I decided to do this. I had to really believe I could make a difference, to change the way that the immigration policy is put in place.”

He began meeting KK at his office, covertly filming each meeting from another room. He alerted the Sunday Star-Times to what he was doing, and this reporter listened to some of the conversations.

Over several meetings, more details of the scam began to emerge. KK explained how the students were unable to get jobs relevant to their degrees because their English wasn’t good enough. They were highly qualified, but the only work they could get was in fast food outlets.

(In order to qualify for permanent residency under New Zealand’s skilled migrant category, applicants must have secured employment relevant to their qualifications to gain the necessary points.)

KK explained that under his scheme, Nottingham would place a bogus advertisement in a newspaper seeking someone for a non-existent position, with an exaggerated job title. After four days, Nottingham would interview the applicant introduced by KK and a few days later give them a letter offering them a two-year contract (a two-year work permit was needed to apply for permanent residency).

Once the letter had been handed over, Nottingham would receive around $10,000. The money would be paid in cash so the transaction could not be traced. The student would get a work permit and, once they gained permanent residency, would resign.

The student would occasionally work at Nottingham’s office, doing menial tasks, in case immigration officers checked up.

The ingenious part of the scam was that the student would pay his or her own wages. A student supposedly earning $45,000 a year would give Nottingham $1730 a fortnight, Nottingham would pay the PAYE and deposit the rest into the student’s bank account. This would be proof of wages for inquisitive immigration officers. In reality, Nottingham would pay the student $200 a week under the table for the work they did around the office.

Over a couple of beers in Nottingham’s office one Saturday afternoon, and with the hidden camera rolling, KK explained to Nottingham how the scheme had worked for him.

KK and his wife had come to New Zealand about eight years earlier on a three-month work visa, later extended to six months. He had applied for residency, but fell two points short of the minimum required. He had a bachelor of commerce and had worked as a marketing manager in India.

KK said to get the extra two points he “needed a job offer”, and so he did a deal with an Auckland chartered accountant he had heard about. KK paid the accountant, who he named on tape, $3000 cash for a false job offer. He would go into the office for two or three hours a week and do odd jobs for free. This lasted for about five months, when he gained his residency. He then moved on to the liquor store job.

KK said the accountant was heavily involved in the false job offer market, writing dozens of job offers using different companies. “Every day he used to give letters,” KK said. He also named a lawyer from a prominent Auckland law firm whom he claimed had handled “500 cases” and had a contact in immigration.

Nottingham asked how this lawyer was paid. KK said: “Always cash five, 10, 15 (thousand).”

Nottingham asked how common the scam was in the foreign student community. “As far as I know everyone has to pay some money. About 60-70% of people have to go under this (scam),” KK said.

He said a lot of those involved wanted residency so they could more easily get into Australia and the US. Others planned to go back to their home countries.

KK started to bring students to Nottingham’s office. Generally their English was poor and their work experience limited. One man had a masters in business administration but his only work experience was as a shift manager at Pizza Hutt. Another had a national diploma in business and had worked at the $2 Shop and KFC.

Eventually Nottingham settled on two students: Hayley, from China, had a bachelor of commerce and administration from a New Zealand university and had worked at Burger King; Henry, also Chinese, had a bachelor in business studies, also gained locally, and had worked as a supervisor at Pizza Hutt.

Hayley brought a mysterious Chinese man to her job interview. He said his name was Alex Ho, and he was her “friend”. Later, Nottingham pressed KK, and was told that Ho was the boss figure that KK had mentioned several times during their meetings.

Nottingham believed he had found his Mr Big.

At a subsequent meeting, Hayley arrived with an “adviser” called Hugh, whom KK explained was an associate of Ho. The tape shows Hugh removing an envelope containing $8000 in $100 bills, and handing it to Nottingham.

After they left, KK returned to Nottingham and asked for his cut. He was paid $2000. “Sometimes I get four,” he said.

KK explained that Ho, a big name in the Chinese business community, was the one who found the students willing to pay for job offers, and then helped them with their residency applications.

He had about 15 lieutenants under him, including KK, Hugh and another Indian man Nottingham had met called Raju. It was their job to scout for job offers.

KK explained on tape that Hayley, for example, had paid $15,000 for the job offer. Of that, $5000 went to Ho.

Nottingham made direct contact with Ho and arranged to meet him to discuss doing more deals together. He taped a meeting in which Ho admitted he ran the operation, but usually did not meet employers himself directly. “I don’t want to put the risk on myself.”

He explained that he did not have to place advertisements to attract students, as word-of-mouth had grown the business. He said he had been doing these deals for five years and had a 70% success rate in gaining permanent residency for the students.

He said he did at least 20 deals a year.

The deals had led to contact with some of the students’ parents, and he claimed to have gone on to do major investment deals with them.

Then Ho made a disturbing claim: he told Nottingham he did not have to worry about being caught by the authorities as he had a senior contact inside the Immigration Department. The contact would tip him off if the department began sniffing around. “I will guarantee that. I will protect the employer first,” Ho said.

LAST WEDNESDAY night, Nottingham couldn’t sleep. The next morning he was to tell Hayley and Henry that he was about to expose the scam in the Star-Times.

He had grown to like them over the several weeks they had worked for him Hayley had been doing odd jobs around the office, while Henry had helped him pour concrete at his house. As far as Nottingham was concerned, they were the true victims of the scam.

Nottingham called the pair into the office on Thursday morning and told them they were “pawns in a game”. They were devastated. Hayley started crying, while Henry wanted to know if this meant he’d have to go back to China. The Star-Times interviewed them both.

Henry said: “I tried to find a job related to my major because it would be helpful for my residency, but it’s very hard. I applied to banking and financial companies and they say I have no experience.”

Through word-of-mouth he heard about a way of getting residency by paying for a job offer. A friend had paid $30,000.

Henry was introduced to an “agent”, a woman, who in turn introduced him to two other agents, Fred and Wang, associates of Alex Ho.

A deal was done with a South Auckland car yard, whereby Henry paid Wang $1000 for a job interview and $29,000 for the job offer. The agents met him at a money exchange in the city and he paid them in cash. He had spent five years in New Zealand saving the money, doing casual work and sometimes working 40 hours a week on top of his studies.

But the “job” at the car yard fell through and the two agents Henry had been dealing with disappeared. Their phones were disconnected and their offices vacated.

Ho, however, said he would find Henry another job, and introduced him to Nottingham. The tape shows Ho handing $8000 to Nottingham on behalf of Henry Nottingham believes it was from the original $30,000.

Hayley described how she heard about the scam through a friend, who had paid Ho $26,000 and was still waiting for residency.

She was taken to Ho’s office in downtown Auckland. She paid Ho $15,000, and was told she would have to pay more as her work visa and residency came through $26,000 in total. It would all be in cash and untraceable.

“I knew this was wrong, I shouldn’t be doing this, but I really want to find a job,” Hayley said.

Hayley said she was introduced to a manager of a large trading firm, but didn’t want to go ahead with that deal. She was then introduced to Nottingham.

THE STAR-TIMES confronted Ho on Thursday. He said his real first name was Anson, but people called him Alex because it was easier. He had been in New Zealand eight years and his main business was facilitating investment by New Zealand companies in China. He also did immigration consultancy.

“I do help some students with the paperwork to apply for the work permit, but I didn’t receive money, this is illegal, I can’t do it.”

He later said he received “a couple of hundred” for each client, and later amended that to “500 to 1000″. He said he only received the “service fee” at the end of the immigration process.

He admitted being a “consultant” for Hayley and Henry, but said he had not received money from them.

“You can have a look at my company account or my personal account, I haven’t made that much money that you’re talking about. You can ask the government to investigate me. What you are talking about, a heap of money, I (would) have to be rich.”

KK said he only had a minor role in helping people find jobs and never received any money. “I’m just working here man (at the liquor store). If any of my customers got any vacancies, I tell the clients to go and approach, apply for the jobs, that’s it.”

He said he had gone to see Nottingham once to hand over a CV.

Nottingham has promised Hayley and Henry that he will do everything he can to help them stay in New Zealand.

All three met an immigration investigator on Thursday, providing details of the scam. Nottingham hopes immigration will give Hayley and Henry immunity in exchange for their testimony. He has kept the money they paid him, and says he will return it. He has offered to continue to employ them on the minimum wage until they find other jobs.

Nottingham believes immigration policy needs to be more realistic.

“How many immigrants have come here under false pretences? I’d say a large amount. But they are here and of course they are going to stay.

“If we are going to have a system it’s got to be based on honesty. We’ve got to lower the standard because we’re actually getting these people in any event.

“We need immigrants, but my belief is work ethic is much better than having passed an exam that you can’t even apply to a job.

“So we need people to come in here who have the work ethic… at the moment the policy seems to be to placate New Zealanders that we are getting highly qualified people.”

HOW IT WORKS

Desperate foreign students who can’t find work in their area of expertise are forced to seek the help of immigration scam operators. They are made to pay up to $30,000 for a fake job offer to help them gain enough points for permanent residency.

The operator has middlemen who find employers willing to take part in the scam.

The employer is paid $8000-$10,000 for a written job offer the job title and salary are fabricated.

In some cases, the student pays his or her own wages; the employer uses this money to pay tax and deposits the rest into the student’s account as “proof of wages”. The employer may pay the student the minimum wage or less for menial work.

The student uses the job offer to gain a two-year work permit and then to apply for permanent residency. Once they have permanent residency, they quit the fake job.