Paul Van Der Leeden, the managing director at Careers Connections, said Australians who had ventured overseas looking for better paid and more secure work had been disappointed to find a weakening job market with the unravelling of the financial crisis.

"We have noticed an increase in the number of expats coming back to Australia looking for work," Mr Van Der Leeden said. "Some that have been [overseas] for two or three years are coming back."

Mr Van Der Leeden said the information technology industry had been hit particularly hard, with employers in Asia feeling more anxious about job security.

He said the Middle East was another problem area for expatriates. Fewer construction engineers were going to Dubai, which had been "a drain for Australian workers for years".

Paul McNally, the director of the IT recruitment specialist Infopeople, said recent changes to the Federal Government's skilled migration program had made it harder for recruitment agencies to sponsor foreign workers - leaving a shortage that returning expatriates had been able to fill.

"We've definitely seen a decline in the [number] of people coming on sponsorship visas after the changes," Mr McNally said.

This, combined with the reduction in job opportunities in Asia and the US, had opened an opportunity for expatriates to return to Australia and find work, Mr McNally said.

"We were expecting around 20,000 roles opening up in Singapore in the next two years mainly in the financial sector but because of what has happened in the financial crisis and the credit crunch, these numbers have declined dramatically," he said.

But Emily Wheeldon, at Beaumont Consulting, said workers from Britain were fleeing an increasingly volatile job market and considering a move to Australia.

"We've definitely seen an increase in the number of applications from the UK," Ms Wheeldon said.

"The UK is linked heavily to the US markets and the banking and finance sectors have been impacted [by the financial crisis]."

Amy Braisby had been working for a recruitment company in England for five years before the financial crisis unfolded.

"It was getting very doom-and-gloom in England; I was seeing more and more redundancies," Mrs Braisby said.

As the British economy slumped further, Mrs Braisby started to consider moving overseas for work. In October she quit her job and applied for a permanent position as a recruitment consultant in Sydney.

"I had been to Australia twice before with my husband and we really liked the standard of living," she said.

She and her husband, Darrell, live in Paddington and say they feel happy with their move to Australia.

"Since I've left I've spoken to friends and family back in England, and it seems to have gotten even worse," Mrs Braisby said.

"From what I've heard the flow on effect [from the financial crisis] hasn't hit Australia as hard as it has in England."