How Do You Prove To ImmD That You Have Tried to Recruit Locally?
What Will The Hong Kong Immigration Department Accept?
Excellent question earlier this week. Great opportunity to slay a few sacred cows.
QUESTION
Hi, one of the requirements for the work visa application is a proof of genuine vacancy. What if a sponsoring company doesn’t do job ads? What can he present? He does recruit locally via his network since he is just a small company. Appreciate your inputs.
ANSWER
It’s important to understand that not every job that has a foreign national candidate for it and a consideration of employment visa hanging off it, not every local job needs to have a local worker for it.
It just depends on all the circumstances of the case. There will be circumstances where you can visit the nature of the position and the circumstances that give rise to that foreign national needed to do that work. It becomes very self-evident that no one will exercise what needs to be undertaken. But how it works is if you are asked by the Immigration Department for proof of a local recruitment exercise, you have to show it. That is if you have conducted it, you need to show that you’ve done it. If you’ve conducted it unsuccessfully, you have an opportunity to explain why, supplying proof, how have you gone about the recruitment exercise and then just explaining how that process works.
If you haven’t conducted it, then you have to justify your application from the perspective that you’re the right person for the job. And either way, the sophistication and consideration exercise really gates the question and the mechanics of the recruitment process, to my way of thinking it may really be a bit hard there’s more important things going here.
So you have to be absolutely certain that no local can do a job before you make a claim that no one locally can reasonably be expected to do that job and that’s where all your focus should lie.
Ok, I hope this helps.
VisaGeeza.Ai – Making Hong Kong Immigration A Lot Easier
Unemployed When Your Eligibility For Right Of Abode Accrues?
Can You Still Qualify For PR Even Without A Job …
First Published June 4, 2103
Do you need to be employed on the date that your 7 year anniversary of your residence in Hong Kong comes up which then allows you apply for the right of abode with the wrinkle that your current employment visa expires on exactly the same date?
QUESTION
I started working in Hong Kong with a working visa on 21st of April 2007.
Since then I have been continuously in Hong Kong, but have been made redundant this year.
My current working visa will expire on the 21st of April 2014.
Since I do not have a job, I will not get a new visa, so that day I will also have to leave Hong Kong.
My question: can I apply for the permanent residency on 25th of April 2014 (as I have been at least 7 years now in Hong Kong, continuously, and I have decided to make it my home) and then leave Hong Kong and come back on a tourist visa while waiting for the -hopefully- approval?
Or just wait abroad untill they contact me? If not, what should I do to ensure that I at least qualify the requirements for application?
I love Hong Kong so much that it would be a shame to just lose the PR because of that small period I am missing.
Thanks a lot.
VisaGeeza.Ai – Making Hong Kong Immigration A Lot Easier
Right of Abode & Continuity of Ordinary Residence Calculation
What Counts & What Doesn’t?
First Published October 4, 2014
Got 2 very similar questions in recently so I’m taking the opportunity to kill 2 birds with one stone…
QUESTIONS
I have a residency visa and this is my 6th year in Hong Kong. I need to go back to my country due to some medical urgency. What amount of time can I spend outside Hong Kong so that my 7 years of continuous stay here remains unaffected?
&
I came to Hong Kong in 2009 as dependent child of my parent. I am supposed to apply for PR in 2015. But I spent more than a year out of Hong Kong to study within this period and I have my academic certificates to support my reason for my stay away. Will the Immigration Department approve my reason or count the 7 years all over again?
VisaGeeza.Ai – Making Hong Kong Immigration A Lot Easier
Is There Such An Animal As A Job Seekers Visa For Hong Kong?
If There Is, Please Tell Me More …
Hong Kong immigration is rife with visa gossip and rumours so I am pleased this question has been raised as it allows me to slay an old dragon once and for all!
QUESTION
Hi Stephen,
Thanks ever so much for your amazing website. I have never seen anything like this before – and I can’t believe it’s all free!
I have been looking around for details about the Job Seekers Visa For Hong Kong but can’t find anything.
Does this visa actually exist?
I have been told by a couple of people that I can come and live here for 3 months no questions asked as I look for a job, then swap that job seekers visa over to a work visa.
How do I go about doing this?
Thank you again!
VisaGeeza.Ai – Making Hong Kong Immigration A Lot Easier
I ended my employment in Hong Kong at the beginning of January.
I looked for work and eventually found and got offered a job, still in Hong Kong, to start in March.
I thought everything was going well. I went in on the 1st of February to sort out the application for the work visa, and they sit me down…
They told me my previous work visa had expired on the 24th of January.
Now, this shocked me. In all the searching and transition to the new job I had completely forgotten to check my old visa.
I had come back after Christmas and assumed I was on a Visitor visa, or that my Employment visa hadn’t run out, because I was allowed back in after my return at Xmas.
I hadn’t checked. This is totally my fault and my mistake, I had completely forgotten.
My new company told me to go straight to Immigration, present myself, put in my new visa application with profuse apologies and explain myself.
I did that, they shouted at me threatening imprisonment.
I had to write a letter to the Director of Immigration explaining what happened.
I did all this, and afterwards the Officer said that was all for today and that they would send a letter to my company in 4-6 weeks.
They let me go with my passport and Hong Kong ID Card, and in my passport is a card with an application reference.
I have no idea what happens now.
They didn’t stamp my passport to allow me to leave the country, so I can’t go and return as a Visitor.
I am here with no visa, and I’m worried that if my work visa is denied, or I am stopped in the meantime, they will imprison me because I stayed here even longer.
No one at my new company is concerned, either because they don’t care or they don’t know. They are backing me and want me to work for them, but that’s it.
So, in your experience, what could happen now? What can I do to find out? How can I protect myself?
VisaGeeza.Ai – Making Hong Kong Immigration A Lot Easier
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ANSWER
Of course, being an overstayer is never a particularly nice thing to experience, but it seems to me that the worst is behind you now.
The advice that you received from your proposed new employer was absolutely on the money, and that was of course to report to the Immigration Department as soon as you discovered they overstay. Do make representations by way of apology and explanation, and in my experience Immigration Department are very often prepared to overlook accidental overstays and it appears from the information you’ve provided me thus far, that in case is in actual fact what did occur.
So, essentially then, by reporting to the Immigration Department you have advised them of the reasons for your overstay, and at the same time you’ve put into them a formal application for you to seek to adjust your sponsor from your old employment visa sponsor through to your proposed new employer.
Because you made the application whilst you were an over-stayer and you overstayed your employment visa, essentially what the Immigration Department are doing is treating your application to change your sponsorship whilst you are in what I’ve couched as the Twilight Zone, and The Twilight Zone is where you are an existing resident, your current conditions of stay prevail, but because you’ve made an application to the Immigration Department to change your employment visa sponsor, they’re not in the position to endorse your passport with anything new, until such a time as they positively finalize your application to change your sponsor, which will take 4 to 5 weeks all things considered.
So, now that it’s sitting in the twilight zone, essentially you can’t leave Hong Kong without first getting a departure memo from the immigration office of its task with considering your change of sponsorship application but by the same token you are not deemed to be an over-stayer at this point, because you’ve essentially regularized it previously, and the Immigration Department have kind of Iike moved past that issue and they’re now focusing on determining whether or not you should be granted the ability to take up this new employer.
Now normally whilst the Immigration Department absolutely frown on over-stayers, the truth is that if you are genuinely now seeking to change your employer and that employment is for all practical purposes a like for like employment, you can go into that application with a reasonable level of confidence that you’re going to get approved notwithstanding the fact that there were these overstay problems associated with you actually formally moving your application into the Department for your change of employer.
So, if you get stopped on the street, the Immigration Department essentially know all about you, they are not in a position to endorse your passport with anything new presently, as I say until your new employment visa application has been finalized. So, I wouldn’t worry about it, if the Immigration Department were going to make any kind of example of you, I think you would have probably felt their wrath at that level by now, but given that they seem to have endorsed your passport with the standard card that speaks to the fact that you’ve now got an active reference as regards your application to change your employer, and that they will as they normally do write to your employer during the currency of the application to change a sponsorship for any outstanding or other information that will allow them to positively consider it in your favor, that is just the normal way that it works.
So, I believe that the hard part of your experience is behind you, I wouldn’t get worried, if the Immigration Department were going to make a move on you, you will hear about it. If you don’t hear about it, you can take some confidence that they are in fact just moving forward with your application to change your employer. Once, it’s approved they will then endorse your passport with a new limit of stay, which I think is before Q1, should be for a one-year period, if they finalize your application in Q 2, yet to be formally determined by the Immigration Department you’ll then get a 2-year limits of stay in the recently announced enhancement measure.
So, if I can put your mind to rest, I hope I’ve done that, but it seems to me that the situation that you find yourself in, whilst regrettable seems to have been dealt with by your letter of explanation and apology, and the fact that the Immigration Department have received your application to change your sponsor have given you an indication that that’s going ahead as a result of the card in your passport along with the file reference number, and the fact you have representation from an immigration officer that the next move will be a letter to your employer or your proposed employer.
So, all things considered I don’t think you’ve got much to worry about.
Okay, I hope you found this useful and gave you some piece of mind.
Can A PRC National Spouse Get A Dependant Visa For Hong Kong?
Can they qualify, if so, how?
The question of immigration status for mainland resident spouses of current or aspiring Hong Kong residents is a bit of a hot potato.
As this PodCast answer below sets out, there is a dual track system in place in the immigration system which makes for winners and losers – and for once, those with the Right of Abode miss out.
QUESTION
“My employer wishes to relocate me from our Shanghai office back to our Hong Kong office. I previously had a Hong Kong work visa from 2007-2010.
I’ve very recently been married to my mainland Chinese wife. Will the fact that she is mainland Chinese adversely affect our ability to get a work visa for myself and a spouse visa for her?
What steps can I take in order to improve the likelihood that we are approved (besides the marriage certificate, mutual bank statements, and photos showing that we’ve been together for a long time)?”
ANSWER
In recent years PRC national mainland resident spouses, who have been sponsored for dependant visasby foreign nationals living or seeking to live in Hong Kong can apply for dependant visa for Hong Kong just like any other foreign national can.
Consequently, in your circumstances, you can apply for a visa to join you as your spouse without concern or respect to their nationality and the fact that suit residents on the mainland at the moment and this is contrary to the situations faced by residents in Hong Kong, who have the rights of abode, that is their permanent residents.
You see, spouses of Hong Kong permanent residents can only sponsor their mainland spouses into Hong Kong on the One Way Permit system, which is subject to a daily quota and as a [00:48] law of many, many years. And actually this is the same for foreign national permanent residence and native Chinese permanent residents of Hong Kong alike.
So, when you make your application for an employment visa to be collected back from back to Hong Kong from Shanghai, you simply included your wife on the ID 990B employment visa application form and then submit the documents to show that you’re happily married, that you live together until now and that you can financially support her.
She will need an endorsement in her travel document from the local Public Security Bureau in Shanghai as well, but after that, basically, your application should be very straightforward and I will not anticipate that you will have any problems being able to relocate to Hong Kong together.
Is There Such An Animal As A Hong Kong Employment Visa To Work For Yourself?
Employment visa to work for yourself? How can you have your cake AND eat it in Hong Kong – working for both yourself and a third-party employer at the same time?
QUESTION
Hi,
I’ve read (or I think I read) that with an employee visa we can transform it to an investor visa with the agreement of the employer.
I don’t find this anymore on the immigration website. Is it right?
What is the procedure to follow (my employer told me he agrees to make what is needed).
To secure an ’employment visa to work for yourself’ and embark on this path, you will need the consent of your existing employer. With their permission, you can approach the Immigration Department and request their approval to engage in a side business. Your primary rationale for employment remains intact, as you will still be employed by your current employer. However, your employer will provide a letter of no objection that supports your desire to pursue a side business.
Apply To ImmD
To successfully obtain the Immigration Department’s permission, you will need to provide a detailed explanation of your side business and demonstrate that it is properly registered. It is crucial to show that your side business will complement your stay in Hong Kong and will not hinder your ability to continue providing employment services for your sponsoring employer.
Pass The Test
In most cases, the Immigration Department is satisfied with these circumstances and grants permission for you to operate your side business while maintaining your full-time employment with your existing employer. This provides a unique opportunity to expand your professional horizons and explore entrepreneurship while still benefiting from the stability of your current employment.
A Little Known Visa
As you point out, this particular approach is widely advertised on the Immigration Department’s website. However, you may have come across this information in one of our previous posts as we try to provide valuable insights and guidance to navigate the intricacies of the Hong Kong immigration process.
Last Words …
I trust you find this information useful as you consider the potential of an employment visa to work for yourself. Seeking professional assistance can ensure a smooth and successful application process. Our team is dedicated to providing the support and expertise you need to make your entrepreneurial aspirations in Hong Kong a reality.
