u/Guytogoto

Hi everyone,
I’m looking for advice from people who have experience with Northern Territory (Australia) Subclass 491 nomination, especially ICT occupations.
I applied for NT nomination about 8–9 months ago under the Subclass 491 visa (ICT Business Analyst – ANZSCO). At the time of lodging my application, all documents were valid, including my ACS skills assessment (Australian Computer Society).
Recently, my application status changed to:
“Waiting for outstanding documents”
NT Migration has now requested:
Updated ACS skills assessment
Updated EOI points breakdown
Updated EOI profile document
My situation:
My ACS skills assessment expired in April
Everything was valid when I applied
The deadline to upload documents is very soon (around 12 June)
ACS does NOT offer renewals, meaning the only option is to apply for a completely new skills assessment, which is expensive
My application has already been in process for about 8–9 months
My questions:
Since ACS does not provide renewals, I would need to apply for a new skills assessment. In similar cases, is this always required by NT Migration, or is the expired assessment (valid at time of application) sometimes accepted?
Has anyone been in a situation where NT requested an “updated skills assessment” — did they strictly require a new one, or did they accept the previous valid one?
Does this request usually mean the application is actively being assessed and close to a decision, or is it just a routine document check stage?
Most importantly — based on your experience, does uploading these documents usually lead to nomination approval, or is it still a competitive/uncertain stage even after submitting everything?
I’m trying to decide whether to:
Spend the money immediately on a new ACS skills assessment, or
Contact NT Migration first to clarify if my expired assessment can still be accepted
Any advice or real experiences would be really appreciated.
Thanks a lot in advance!