How Do Foreign National Children Resident In Hong Kong For 7 Years Go On To Acquire Permanent Residency Here?

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Family Visas, Long Stay & PR, Your Question Answered / 2 responses

How Do Foreign National Children Resident In Hong Kong For 7 Years Go On To Acquire Permanent Residency Here?

The test for the right of abode for foreign national children resident in Hong Kong for 7 years is the same as for adults but the manifestation of that PR takes a slightly different form…

QUESTION

I’ve heard that our children can independently hold permanent residency once they turn 7.  Is this correct and if so, how do we go about applying for it?

Thanks!

ANSWER

Once a child that was not born in Hong Kong has lived here continuously prepared and not less than seven years and that child goes on to make an application to have his eligibility for a permanent identity card verified and that exercise involves exactly the same approvability test as is applied to adult counterparts that are also seeking to go ahead and secure the right of abode in Hong Kong.

So using the context of children that are naturally resident in Hong Kong with their parents, the evidence that’s submitted in support of that application is that they are together with their parents and that they are in school. And the Immigration Department take proof of schooling typically as being definitive evidence that they have been a continuously ordinarily residents in Hong Kong.

And of course they do check to see their whereabouts during that time, so insofar as the test goes, it is essentially the same as it is for adults when it comes to children. But the manifestation of the right of abode is reflected not in the issue of a permanent identity card. Because the child, if it’s under 11 years of age, can’t secure a permanent ID, can’t secure any kind of identity card.

Effectively once they get to 11 they get a juvenile ID card and that juvenile ID card states that the holder has the right of abode but prior to that the actuality of having had your very verification for eligibility for the right of abode is reflected in a sticker that’s placed in the back of the passport of the child and then the child then presents that at the boundaries and at the airport when the child is travelling and of course, the Immigration Department immediately admits the child on the strength of the child having the right of abode.

So that’s it it’s – an endorsement to the passport first until the issue of the first ID card where upon the permanent identity card is formally issued. The only wrinkle to that is that at the point of issuing the ID card at the age of 11, there will be a further examination to ensure that the child has remained continuously and ordinarily in Hong Kong.

Throughout the proceeding, say in this case three or four years, if the child had his eligibility verified at the age of seven and if the child has not been continuously and ordinarily resident in Hong Kong throughout all at that time and/or has been absent I should say from Hong Kong for more than three years at a stretch then the ID card that will be issued will be a right to land ID card and will not be a permanent identity card.

So eligibility can be verified through the placements of the sticker in the passport, but you still need to maintain your connections to Hong Kong under the basic law. Which means that a child must have been in Hong Kong on at least one occasion during the interim period over a course of three years in order to maintain eligibility for the right of abode and the issue of the permanent identity card accordingly.

Otherwise, as I’ve stated the child will be issued with an ID card that grants him the right to land.

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What Chance of Approval For A 3-6 Month Intern Visa For Hong Kong & What Documents Are Needed?

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Employment Visas, Your Question Answered / 14 responses

What Chance of Approval For A 3-6 Month Intern Visa For Hong Kong & What Documents Are Needed?

Intern visa for Hong Kong? Internships for foreign national students seeking experience in Hong Kong are getting ever more popular…

QUESTION

Hi,

Our company is trying to hire an intern on a short 3-6 months internship.

He holds a British passport.

If he meets all the criteria on the Hong Kong Immigration Website, will there be any chance he will still be rejected for the visa?

On top of it, the government requires the sponsoring company to be a well-established company, capable of providing the proposed training, how can we prove that when we apply for him?

Do you have any tips on helping an intern apply for a training visa successfully?

Many thanks.

ANSWER

Documents Referenced in the PodCast Answer & Needed for an Intern (Training) Visa Application

The Applicant

Application form ID992A

Copy of applicant passport bio details pages

Passport size photograph

Updated CV

Personal bank statement

School Transcript of Academic records

Supporting letter issued by the school printed on school letterhead

The Engaging Sponsor

Sponsorship Application form ID992B

Signed Internship Agreement

Copy of Business Registration Certificate

Certificate of Incorporation

Latest Audited Financial Statement

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Hong Kong Right Of Abode Application – Arguing Away Missing Periods Of Residence

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Hadley Says…, Long Stay & PR / 42 responses

This article presents solutions to missing periods of residence when it comes about a Hong Kong Right of Abode Application

The essential approvability test for a Hong Kong Right of Abode application is that you have been continuously and ordinarily resident in the HKSAR for a period of not less than 7 years AND that you have taken concrete steps towards making Hong Kong your ONLY place of permanent residence.

“Continuously”, for the purposes of the test, effectively means that any absences from Hong Kong during that time were temporary and lasted less than 6 months.

Moreover, at the time you departed it must have been your intention to be absent temporarily only – as evidenced by what you leave behind in Hong Kong to return back to at the end of your temporary sojourn abroad.

The application form ROP 145 specifically asks for details, with reasons, in respect of any absences of more than 6 months, otherwise the Hong Kong Immigration Department do not expressly raise the issue – unless it is obvious, that you have indeed spent a great deal of time continuously outside of Hong Kong during the requisite 7 years.

And the collection of documents you submit in support of your application should effectively envelope any missing periods of residence and should consist of Hong Kong tax returns, proof of accommodation, official bills, employment confirmations and, ideally, your Statement of Travel Records for the entire time you have lived in Hong Kong.

Oh, and you need to ensure that you have no outstanding taxation liabilities here as well – otherwise, your case will simply not be approved!

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The Twists And Turns Of An Unusual Hong Kong Permanent Residency Application

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Case Study, Investment Visas, Long Stay & PR / 10 responses

Although this case study is based on a situation I was asked to provide guidance to many years ago, its content is still relevant today.

 

Our client was a French national with a wife and 5 year old daughter – all of them, French citizens.

He had first arrived in Hong Kong in 2004 as a student to undertake an MBA programme at the University of Hong Kong.

Upon graduation in 2006, he joined a European investment bank where he worked continuously until 2010 when he was made redundant as part of the banking challenges associated with the GFC.

At the time he instructed us, he had an employment visa sponsored by his ex-employing investment bank with a 2 year period of stay endorsed inside his passport, taking him up just short of the complete 7 year time frame for the purposes of an application for the Right of Abode.

In 2010, with the chances of him gaining further employment in the investment banking game unlikely in the near term, our client decided to start a French wine importing business – but did not apply for an adjustment in his immigration status to allow him to be able to do this. He really needed an investment visa but had never bothered to get one.

As the period of stay availed by the investment bank expired 6 weeks before he would have been continuously resident for the 7 years needed for a Right of Abode application, he decided that he would take him family out of Hong Kong at the time his employment visa expired and bring them all back in as visitors, gaining a 90 day period of stay when they entered, waited six weeks, then submitted an application for the Right of Abode.

This was in 2011, 2 weeks before he asked for our help.

At the time of his application, he didn’t realise that you can’t apply for the Right of Abode if you have a visitor visa.

You need to be ‘resident’ at the time you apply. Instead he and his family were ‘visiting’.

The Hong Kong Immigration Department knocked back his application for permanent residency on this ground and so he found his way to us.

The key issues in this application were:

1 – the fact of his visitor visa status at the time he applied for the Right of Abode.

2 – the 11 months he had been working his French wine import business, unapproved by the Hong Kong Immigration authorities.

3 – as a prior student from HKU he could take advantage as a ‘returning graduate‘ and be afforded ‘positive consideration’ for any application that he might make in order to take up a new job in Hong Kong (for which he’d need an offer of employment from a suitably qualified sponsor).

Coincidentally, just after our client approached us for advice, an ex-colleague of his from the investment bank where he had worked for four years previously, asked him to come and consult on an energy project in the Philippines.

This ex-colleague had, three years prior, provided consulting services through his own, newly established one-man company and had turned over HKD10 million in consulting fees in the first 18 months. However, the project had come to a temporary halt, as these things often do, as certain government approvals processes played themselves out.

The project has been in a temporary hiatus but had, just recently, been reactivated in light of the Philippines government providing whatever consents had been necessary for it to progress to the next phase.

Consequently, and somewhat out of the blue, our client received an offer of employment from his ex-colleague for him to assist him in the next phase of the energy project.

This was good news on the one hand, but on the other, the employing business was still very much a ‘brass plaque’ consulting concern which had been effectively dormant for the last 18 months.

On the plus side, it had a strong balance sheet and also had a receipt from the Hong Kong Inland Revenue for more than HKD1 million it had paid in profits tax the year before. It also had a formal notification from its sole client that the energy project was now recommencing and thus was manifestly ready to re-engage in providing services once more.

We advised our client that this could be a heaven sent opportunity for us to secure an employment visa for him (with dependent visas for his wife and daughter) relying on the relaxed application consideration criteria which the Hong Kong Immigration Department afford to non local graduates of Hong Kong Universities.

We did, on the other hand, counsel that as the sponsoring employer was pretty much still a shell of an operation, there would be some tussling with the Immigration Department to persuade them of its bona fides as a quality employment visa sponsor.

As expected, we locked horns with the Department about the quality of the sponsor and had several exchanges with them each time providing them with more information, proof of the good prospects for the business and the critical role our client was going to be playing in its operations.

Finally, we suggested to the HKID that they approve our client’s employment visa subject to Business Review at the end of 12 months, a not unusual proposition, but suitable in the circumstances. The Hong Kong Immigration Department agreed and our client and his family’s applications were duly approved subject to this condition.

As the strategy all along had been to provide our client with a residence visa for the purposes of his Right of Abode application, the fact of this Business Review was ultimately unimportant because it would only come into play if our client applied for an extension to his new employment visa 12 months down the road.

In fact, two months after this, their Right of Abode applications were approved and so Business Review was never an issue. The really good news is that this client is now providing consulting services to the energy project AND running his French wine importing business quite lawfully as a permanent resident.

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Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Employment Visas, Hadley Says… / 5 responses

No way, for sure not  – it simply is not the way the process works…

Your Hong Kong employment visa belongs to you, not your employer. They are just responsible for the sponsorship.

If the relationship with your employer sours for any reason and your employment terminates this is what happens to your visa:

– Your privilege to work ceases. You can no longer engage in any employment without making a new application to the HKID first.

– Your privilege to reside continues. The HKID will ordinarily allow you to remain in Hong Kong until your current limit of stay expires, whereupon you are required to leave Hong Kong.

In the meantime, this usually affords you the time you need to take stock of your affairs and get yourself back in the driving seat en route to a new employment in Hong Kong.

The HKID do not engage in any blame games as to why a sponsored employment has come to an end and only look forward not backwards

So don’t be intimidated by an errant employer who believes they have some kind of leverage over you as the sponsor of your employment visa.

The reality is, they have no such leverage whatsoever and you are a free agent for visa purposes and have nothing to worry about in this regard.

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Am I Compelled To Apply For Hong Kong Permanent Residency After 7 Years Or Can I Maintain The Status Quo Of My Present Employment Visa?

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Employment Visas, Long Stay & PR, Your Question Answered / 3 responses

Once you have achieved 7 years continuous ordinary residence in Hong Kong, your long stay immigration options open up considerably…

QUESTION

My current working visa is due to expire at the end of  September, (previously I was given an extension of 3 years in 2010), this I assume was so that I would be valid for Hong Kong Permanent Residency, (as I have been here for over 7 years now).

My question is should I seek Hong Kong Permanent Residency and/or can I just continue to add an extension to my working visa if I don’t want Hong Kong Permanent Residency?

 In addition, for either of these cases, do I have to always change/add my wife’s and 2 children’s passports visa extension to reflect these changes, (my wife would have been here for 6 years and my kids were born here in 2008 and 2011 (do they also become PR’s on the back of me?)

ANSWER

This is a great question and slightly unusual inasmuch as the vast majority of foreign nationals who spend their time in Hong Kong see the Right of Abode and Permanent Residency as a sort of the ultimate end goal. But you do raise some fascinating topics and I’m really pleased to have the opportunity to address them for you.

The bottom line is that no, you absolutely do not have to apply for Permanent Residency. Once you’ve gotten across the seven-year hurdle, by no means at all are you forced to do that or indeed anything. If you wish to maintain your current employment visa on an ongoing basis, then you just go through the process of extending your employment visa in September of this year, using the normal processes – you could use our visa extension kit to this end to do that, and you’d expect the immigration department would more than likely give you a three-year period of stay.

Given that you are eligible for the Right of Abode, you are certainly not compelled. I mean, a key thing about the ride of abode is that you need to put your hand on your heart and make a declaration that you’re taking Hong Kong as your only place of permanent residence. So if you can’t genuinely do that for good – reason the question is begged as to what happens come September, do you in fact need to extend your current employment visa, which at all times will require the support of your current employer? You do, in fact have another option, and that is to apply for Unconditional Stay.

This effectively is very much a similar test to the Right of Abode where you have to show that you’ve been continuously an ordinarily resident in Hong Kong for a period of not less than seven years. On the basis you pass that approvability test, then the immigration department will avail you of a status called Unconditional Stay, which means, effectively you can stay here unconditionally, and you don’t require the consent of your existing employer.

In respect of extending an employment visa, you remove all conditions to your current limit of stay including a limit of time, and then they will endorse your passport to say that effectively you’ve got Unconditional Stay and that you can live here unconditionally. The only condition associated to your Unconditional Stay is that you need to be present physically in Hong Kong on at least one occasion in any twelve month given period.

So, effectively with Unconditional Stay you can come and go, you can work for anybody, you can join in the business, you can engage in any lawful activity just so long as you do it in Hong Kong on the basis of you having been here for on at least one occasion in any twelve month given period.

Thus, for that status of Unconditional Stay which is just an administrative convenience on the part of the Immigration Department rather than a right (as it would be under the Right of Abode), there’s no requirement for you to make any declarations as to having taken Hong Kong as your only place of permanent residence. So you may find that useful.

In terms of your family members, the reality is that every single one of your family members, both your two children and your wife are going to have to qualify for the Right of Abode by themselves inasmuch as they will have to get to seven years continuous ordinary residence and they will then have to make applications to the effect that they’ve taken Hong Kong as their only place of permanent residence and go on to secure the Right of Abode.

Similarly after seven years, you can make applications for them to have Unconditional Stay status so that it would accord with yours, on the basis that your family members do continue to remain in Hong Kong with you whilst or after you’ve adjusted your immigration status potentially to Unconditional Stay or the Right of Abode, they’re going to have to continue their current dependent visa status through to such a time that they qualify for either unconditional stay or ride of abode in their own right. Nothing will happen automatically just because you’ve changed your own immigration status. They have to earn it independently of you as. So they would get extensions to their dependent visas until such a time as they be able to make an application for either as I say, unconditional stay or the right of abode in their own right subsequently. Okay, I hope you found that useful. Bye.

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Foreign Nationals Working In Hong Kong – Getting Married, Changing Visas & The Immigration Status Of Children Born Here Subsequently

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Employment Visas, Family Visas, Your Question Answered / 4 responses

So, what are the immigration implications of getting married and then having children in Hong Kong if you are a temporary resident presently holding an employment visa?

QUESTION

Hi,

Can you please help with a few questions?

1. I am getting married next month and would like to cancel my employment visa through my employer, and change to a dependent visa through my spouse. I would like to remain with the same employer. Is that possible? Would I still require an employment contract with my office (same employer) or would I no longer need an employment contract.

2. If we are married in the US and have a US marriage license, how do I register that in Hong Kong?

3. If two US citizens, living in Hong Kong on employment visas, have their baby in Hong Kong, is that baby now a Hong Kong citizen, or does his/her status follow the visa status of the parents?

PODCAST ANSWER

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