LPR and AIP Application

[cpa100]

Hi all,

I am from HK (HK Passport) and my girlfriend is from mainland China (Chinese passport). We both studied Bachelor of Commerce in University of New South Wales in Australia (Year 2002 - 2004) and then straight to MBA course in University of Technology Sydney (Year 2005 - 2006). We both are fresh grad with no work experience.

On early Janurary 2007, I applied AIP and my girlfriend applied LPR (two seperate applications as we are not married yet) thru SMC office in Hong kong.

The SMC consultant told us that mine one would take about 2-3 months while my gf one would take 3-4 months. It is early April now, and I just rang them if my application had been approved.

However, they now say that mine one would need 3-4 months and my gf one would like 4-5 months...

We are both a bit worry about our application (worry about being denied to get AIP or LPR).

So, my questions are :

1) Any one has recent experience on AIP / LPR? How long did your application take recently?

2) SMC agent had obviously looked thru all our documentations (such as university transcripts, identifications etc etc.....) when we apply 3 months ago, they seemed perfectly satisfy with our documents. If so, does it mean that we should be able to get the approval of the application by the Singaporean government? (Because I think that SMC is actually a subsidiary of Singapore immigration department to do these PR applications???)

3) There are a few SMC offices (Indonesia, HK, Singapore etc etc...). Are there any difference regarding to application period between those agenies?

We both are worrying about our applications...

Thanks for your input!!!!!!