ISSUE
Friday, February 14, 2025
Volume 16 . Issue 46
Hundreds of people who wanted to get a MIQ slot were part of the MIQ’s virtual lobby that opened at 8 am NZT today.
According to a statement by Joint Head of MIQ, Megan Main, “The lobby which opened just before 8 am has 25,000 people moved into a queue. This number continued to grow as people have been entering the queue throughout the room release (these people go to the back of the queue).
“There are around 3,200 rooms available for this room release. Within the first 20 minutes, around 400 vouchers had been secured. Dates are available across September, October, November and December. December has been the most popular month. This is not a first-come-first-served model. It doesn't matter when people arrived in the lobby in that one hour between 8 and 9 am - everyone has an equal chance of getting through to try to secure a room.
“There is no limit on how many people can wait in the lobby and there is no need to keep refreshing the website anymore. People can see their place in the queue. Although this new feature should improve user experience, it is not a silver bullet — it will not fix the issue of supply and demand. Once all rooms have been taken, the lobby will be closed and anyone in the queue will be informed that they have unfortunately missed out this time."
Ms Main did give a silver lining of hope in her statement, "But there will be more rooms coming, there’s still several thousand rooms to be released through to the end of the year The recent pause on vouchers has meant demand has built up. So we will be staggering releases and there will be more available very soon – the next will be next week.
“We will continue to announce room releases in advance (at least 24 to 48 hours before the release) so people will know when to come back. There is not an unlimited number of MIQ rooms and we do not release them all at once, and there’s a good reason for that — we’re in the middle of a global pandemic and we need to keep New Zealand safe. We understand people want to enter MIQ on a date of their choosing, but we have to ensure arrivals in New Zealand occur in a safe, managed way.”
However, most of the hundreds of people who took part in the virtual lobby in the hope to secure a MIQ voucher for themselves or their loved one called their experience 'a nightmare.'
Sharing his story, a Kiwi named Tim Vaughan, who is currently in Singapore and wants to come to New Zealand to be with his wife and 3 young kids, says, “I haven't seen my family for three years and had been trying to get a MIQ slot for many months now. I came to Singapore for a work assignment which is now over and I want to go back to New Zealand, I had tried the old system as well as the new system. Despite entering the lobby early, the slot I got was 18,680. It seemed to be a total disaster. I fail to understand why there is no prioritisation.
A person who wants to come to New Zealand for holiday is competing with someone who is coming to meeting their dying family member. It is not fair. The lack of clarity and ambiguity around this process is inhumane. It is just a lottery and this government is doing nothing to help Kiwis stranded like me to get home, which is very heart-breaking."
Maninder Kaur, who is currently in Australia and was booking a slot for her sister Parmit Kaur, who is currently in India, shared her experience. "I was in the lobby exactly at 8 am according to NZ time but despite that, I was unable to get a slot for my sister. I think this system is disappointing for people like my sister who are desperate to get back to their country. They are playing a game of lottery with people’s lives which is so unfair.”
Sharing her story Dale Singh, who was trying to get a slot for her mom and brother says, “The demand is far far beyond the supply! The MIQ system is an absolute failure. Increase rooms to meet the demand or find other ways to accommodate kiwis who are wanting to return home.”
Even the political parties have shared their disappointment with this virtual lobby system. ACT Leader David Seymour was quoted as saying, "More than 22,000 New Zealanders in the MIQ waiting room within hours of its opening have shown why locking down and locking out is unsustainable. The demand for MIQ is now clear for the first time. Twenty-two thousand is 110 times more than daily capacity and it would take months to clear the backlog. The Government needs to be more innovative and flexible to clear the MIQ backlog. Why can’t double vaccinated people from low-risk countries self-isolate? MBIE did a desktop analysis which showed 37 hotels were suitable for MIQ capacity that aren't currently being used. Why not? With every passing day, New Zealand’s isolation is turning from its great strength to its greatest weakness. As the rest of the world moves on from COVID, we must be prepared to move with them.
“Under ACT’s plan, owners of currently mothballed hotels could seek a licence to operate MIQ according to strict criteria. These criteria would make for safer MIQ than the standards met by the Government. The simple question for the Government is: do they want to safely reconnect with the world, or keep us in crisis mode forever?
However, there have been few who got lucky and couldn’t thank their stars enough.
One such lucky person is Vivek Thirani, an NZ resident who hails from Sikkim, who managed to get a slot for his wife Natasha Dalmia Thirani, who is currently in India. Sharing his story, Vivek says, “I am an NZ resident and came to NZ on 31st August after spending 14 days in Nepal. I recently got married in India in April this year and had filed for my wife’s partnership visa. Her visa came through two days after I had left India. Once she got her visa, the next hurdle was getting a MIQ slot for her. The whole process has been super stressful for me and my family. But luckily, when I entered the lobby at 8:02 am NZT, I got the number 3669 in the queue and eventually managed a slot. I feel I had been very lucky. I will be sorting out flights now."
Another success story is of Andy, who is currently in Spain, “I think this system is better than the previous one but still stressful. We had three registrations. All of us were in the queue. My daughter got slot number 2 which was super lucky. And once she was accepted, we added me and my son. And now we are flying on 9th November.”