AI & Immigration Advice
It was inevitable that AI and tools like ChatGPT or Co-Pilot would start to become the “go to” sources for many people considering a move to another country - after all if you can find out what to make for dinner, with the five things you have left in your fridge, using AI, why couldn’t it also tell you whether or not you might qualify for a visa and then by extension how to get it.
There is also a proliferation of companies now trying to sell the “AI Visa” solution, attempting to give people access to a platform that will tell them if they qualify, what visa they might qualify for and then how to go about applying for that visa - again an inevitable consequence of our sudden need to do everything with AI.
So the question is, are these AI Visa mash-ups useful, and can they really tell you how to move yourself and your family to another country or is their potential to hallucinate, perhaps still too much of a risk? Considering our role is to provide that very same advice, is it possible that licensed advisers (like many other professional services) might be out of a job?
Having worked in this industry for over two decades and being an avid fan of technology, I feel pretty confident that the need for the human element will remain for a long time to come. While AI systems are becoming significantly more powerful (and arguably more intrusive), relying on them for a process as complex as this is still a very significant risk - not because the AI can’t find the relevant information necessarily but because applicants often don’t know the right questions to ask. AI can read and interpret the rules, pretty well, but unless you know what rules to research you are still just stumbling around in the dark.
For anyone considering the move, and then considering how AI might be able to help in that process, this article will hopefully add some guardrails to that process.
Help or Hindrance
In some ways AI can be a really useful way of sifting through the volumes of information that exist in terms of our various visa options and I have tested that theory by using platforms like ChatGPT to try and distil the main visa pathways. Generally these AI systems can filter down the main pathways based on a pretty broad description of your circumstances and give you the key points you need to work out which options might exist.
It can also give you a more simplified way to understand how those pathways work, which is useful considering our rule book often reads like it was written in some sort of alien language. It can also highlight the key criteria in each visa pathway and some of the obstacles you might face.
Using AI For Visa Queries
AI can do many things, but when it comes to the visa process, it is still far from qualifying as a trusted source of advice.
However all of that is useful at a very surface level, and where things become more complicated is the fact that most people don’t actually know which questions to ask, that might then change how that suggested pathway could work.
For example, if you tell AI your age, nationality, marital status and level of qualifications and experience, it will reliably tell you that the skilled migrant category could be an option for you and it will even list the various options within that category that you can pursue. So far so god. However if you forget to tell it that you are a dual national, have a declined visa history, a criminal record or maybe you have a medical condition, then what you have been given is the sales brochure without the fine-print.
Most applicants don’t necessarily understand what information might be absolutely crucial to their potential success or failure and if you are a family, then the specific details for each person included will have a bearing on that potential application as well. So whilst AI might be able to read the information available on the internet and provide it to you in a more legible, easy to understand format, it cannot account for all the questions that you really do need to ask, to determine if you actually do qualify.
Of course AI is also being used at the other end of the process and I have seen a growing number of applicants who might have hit a bit of a wall (possibly one created by AI) then use AI to try and dig their way out. Relying on ChatGPT or something similar to draft a response to INZ questions or to research the answers to concerns that an officer might have raised. Again, the same problems come up, because unless you understand why that officer is raising those concerns, no amount of prompting is going to give you the answer that matches your situation and the potential response needed.
So AI can be useful, in terms of filtering out a lot of the noise that surrounds visa categories and can give you a simplified each to understand starting point, but determining if you are actually eligible to apply or helping you to navigate the process is something that still requires human input. That input is backed by years of not only understanding the written rules, but also how INZ operates and those can be two quite different things at times.
The Gap Between AI & Visas
One reason that there remains a significant gap between AI and a potential migrant is the fact that people are all so unique, whereas there is only one set of visa rules (although there are lots of different interpretations of those rules). So while AI can deal with the stuff that is written down and read/understand it (to a degree), it fails to appreciate how important each person’s very unique circumstances are to working out that eligibility.
Even the most detailed, prompt in the world, will still only give you an educated guess, and that is assuming that you know what your potential visa prompt needs to contain - and that is where the gap exists.
The People
The one thing AI cannot account for is the complexity of people and trying to measure that against how visa rules work.
To really know whether you qualify and in turn which questions to ask AI to try and help you work that out, you need to first know what is important in terms of that process.
So its really a bit of a circular problem. You might think you qualify for a visa, ask AI and it will potentially confirm that. But if you haven’t told it all the really important things about your life (and the lives of your family members), that will potentially have a bearing on that application, it will never be able to give you the advice you need.
In fact if you ask AI whether or not it can be relied on as a source of advice for a potential migrant, making the move (anywhere) the answer is a little daunting…
“AI can give a broad idea of NZ visa options, but it has major limits. It may rely on outdated information, overlook personal details, miss risks or exceptions, and often sounds confident even when incorrect. AI can’t assess evidence, strategy, or borderline situations the way a licensed adviser or lawyer can — and sharing personal data with AI also carries privacy risks.”
The most concerning part of that response is possibly the potential for AI to sound more confident than it should be, even when its wrong. You might think you have been delivered the right strategy and process for what could be one of the biggest decisions of your life, when really you just have some computer-generated, wishful thinking.
That is not to say that humans are going to get this right 100% of the time either, however we have the benefit of having lived through the experience with clients and those of us with that experience, also appreciate how INZ itself works, which is not necessarily something published on a website. It is all those finer details, that mean the gap between AI and Visas will remain for a long-time to come (I am picking permanently).
Single Source Of Truth
I often tell my clients that when they come on board with me and my team, that it is our advice that becomes their “single source of truth” (I did steal that line from the previous Government). If you pay for good advice, then rely on it and follow it. That of course can be hard to do when you have access to so many other sources, but I back myself and my team to outwit and outsmart AI every single time.
I can also stand behind that claim, having dealt with several inquiries over the last few weeks from people who approached me, having been told by AI that they qualified - whilst they do qualify, it wasn’t exactly in the same way AI might have imagined and in two examples, there was really important details that AI had missed, which changed the entire strategy for both families.
My advice, to anyone considering the move, is to do your homework and even use AI to get the general idea of whether or not you might be in the game or not, but as far as betting your entire future on it - seek that human input. Licensed advisers, live, eat, breath and sometimes dream about this process, and we do it over and over again for clients in very different circumstances. Even though the rules we are applying under might be the same, there is an incredible amount of knowledge built up by applying those same rules to very different applicants.
That wisdom and experience gives us the ability to see how your specific situation might measure up, working through the details and the fine print to give you a much more reliable plan to work with.
If you are considering a move to New Zealand and looking for advice you can trust, then get in touch with the humans at Turner Hopkins Immigration Specialists today - 09 486 2169 or email immigration@turnerhopkins.co.nz.
Until next week.
