Hong Kong Visas Made Easy

Must Read: True Story of a Deluded Foreign National Trying to Sue His Way to a Hong Kong Employment Visa

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Musing, Refusals & Appeals, Visitor Visas / 13 responses

First Published August 27, 2012

Note: I am presently fully engaged on the launch of Hong Kong Visa Sherpa so time’s a bit tight to publish new content on this website for the moment. Consequently I am surfacing some interesting posts from down the years, giving them a lick of paint and showing them the light of day again!

 
Sue his way to a Hong Kong employment visa?

It is a very rare occasion indeed that private court hearings see the light of day and it tickles me pink that Mr Justice Lam allowed his ‘in Chambers’ decision to be published, so it can be read by anyone generally.

In case you’re not too taken with reading legal judgments, this is the plot from an immigration situation that unfolded in Hong Kong in February of this year:

1. A US national flies from Sydney to Hong Kong en route to London.

2. After touching down in Hong Kong he changed his mind and decided he wanted to fly to Paris instead.

3. The airline wanted more money for the route change, and the man didn’t want to pay.

4. In light of this he passed through immigration at CLK as a visitor and determined he was now ‘stranded’, and reckoned he was incapable of feeding and accomodating himself.

5. He then emailed the Chief Executive, the Secretary for Justice and the Hong Kong Immigration Department claiming he was being held in Hong Kong against his will by the denial of his right to take up employment as a visitor as he wanted to work to obtain shelter and food.

6. It was, he contended, impossible for him to be a ‘visitor’ in these circumstances as he couldn’t leave and his treatment amount to ‘torture’ and thus a breach of the Torture Convention.

7. His legal claim was that he should be given permission to work in order to support himself.

8. The HKID wrote to him and told he needed to make an application for an employment visa  under the terms of the General Employment Policy (just like everyone else).

9. In the meantime, he sought the Court’s intervention to judicially review the decisions leading to his predicament, but didn’t want to pay the (modest)fees for this and demanded (and received) an urgent hearing in the judge’s chambers to try to present his case.

10. The judge kicked him into touch post haste!.

You couldn’t make this stuff up!

You can read the complete 2 page judgement here.

More Stuff You May Find Interesting or Useful 

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The Hong Kong Visa Handbook – now available in good book stores everywhere!

Hong Kong employment visa – when all else failed we appealed to the Chief Executive – and won!

Should you ever get married just for Hong Kong visa purposes?

Paying for visa help? The Who’s Who of the Hong Kong immigration services industry

Eligibility Criteria for the Hong Kong Working Holiday Visa Scheme

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Musing, Special Programmes / 88 responses

Image: dontstopliving.net

The Hong Kong working holiday visa programme first came into play in April 2001 and is meant to aid cultural and education exchanges between HK and those nations who take part on a bi-lateral basis.

Participants in the Hong Kong Working Holiday Scheme are not permitted to engage in permanent employment and should not work for the same employer for more than six months (for participants from the Republic of Korea) or three months (for participants from Australia, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Japan and New Zealand) during their visit in the HKSAR.

Participants from Australia, Canada, Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea and New Zealand may also enrol in study or training course(s) during their time under the programme.

The Scheme permits younger people (between 18 and 30) to make an application for a Working Holiday Visa for Hong Kong which enables them to remain in the HKSAR for a maximum vacation period of one year. During their stay, the Working Holiday Visa holder can take up short term work for a period of less than 3 months with any one employer and can study for a fixed duration.

The tradition of the Scheme works to permit a lengthened vacation type experience of working, living and also, the chance of studying in HK for an unqualified maximum period of one year but the Scheme shouldn’t be viewed as an alternative choice to a work visa.

Extensions outside the twelve months aren’t available and an applicant may only receive one Working Holiday Visa during the life of the Scheme.

The overall objective of the Scheme is to offer a valuable opportunity for younger people to broaden their horizons and the programme is subject to a maximum quota of visas to be issued each year.

Countries that have bilateral Working Holiday Scheme agreement with the HKSAR (as at 1 January 2019)

• Australia (annual quota = 5000)
• Austria (annual quota = 100)
• Canada (annual quota = 200)
• France (annual quota = 750)
• Germany (annual quota = 300)
• Hungary (annual quota = 200)
• Ireland (annual quota = 200)
• Japan (annual quota = 1500)
• Korea (Republic of) (annual quota = 1000)
• Netherlands (annual quota = 100)
• New Zealand (annual quota = 400)
• Sweden (annual quota = 500)
• United Kingdom (annual quota = 1000)

Temporary employment

• Australian citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than three months
• Austrian citizens – not allowed to work for more than six months
• British citizens – not allowed to work for more than 12 months
• Canadian citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than three months
• Dutch citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than six months
• French citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than six months
• German citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than three months
• Hungarian citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than six months
• Irish citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than three months
• Japanese citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than six months
• Korean citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than six months
• New Zealand citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than three months
• Swedish citizens – not allowed to work for the same employer for more than six months

Applications are selected on a first-come-first-served basis. Processing of applications takes about 3 weeks.

Conditions for successful application include:

* You must hold a valid national passport issued by the participating country and be ordinarily residing in that participating country.

* Your primary intention is to holiday in Hong Kong.

* You must be aged between 18 and 30.

* You must be able to show financial proof of having enough funds to maintain yourself during the stay in Hong Kong. (e.g. bank statement, saving accounts passbooks, and the like).

* You must have a return air ticket or financial proof of having sufficient funds to purchase one home.

* You must hold medical and comprehensive hospitalisation and liability insurance to cover your time in the HKSAR – certain nationalities: see here.

* The process is by way of direct application in Hong Kong via a local representative or direct to the HKID via mail.

* Applications can also be submitted via the network of Chinese diplomatic and consular missions in the participating countries.

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More Stuff You May Find Useful Or Interesting

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100% Hong Kong Visa Application Success Rate? Take It All With A Grain Of Salt

The 10 Key Reasons Why Foreigners Seek Visas to Live and Work in Hong Kong

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Employment Visas, Family Visas, Investment Visas, Long Stay & PR, Musing, Special Programmes / 10 responses

First Published June 3, 2012

Migration demographic analyses first came into play in 1885 in the Journal of the Statistical Society when geographer Ernest George Ravenstein essayed what he termed the “Laws of Migration” seeking to set out an explanation for and attempting to predict migration patterns in England.

In his seminal paper, Ravenstein compared 1871 and 1881 UK census data and plotted patterns of migration movements and from his observations he contrived a series of “Laws of Migration”.

Among those laws, Ravenstein considered that there was a process of “absorption” in which people immediately surrounding a fast-growing location would move into it and the gaps they left behind were filled by others from more distant areas.

This process continued until the underlying attraction behind the movement of populations was no longer sufficiently compelling enough to maintain the momentum and the ‘migration’ was completed. Moreover, Ravenstein also stated that there was a law of “dispersion”, being the opposite of “absorption”.

Ravenstein suggested that the “Laws of Migration” were underpinned by a number of “pull” factors and “push” factors. Pull factors attracted inward migration and applied to both the highly skilled and the less so whilst push factors prompted migrants to leave their country of origin.

Examples of the “push” factors cited included high unemployment rates, low income, political instability, poor security and natural disasters. Family connections, higher income opportunities, improved medical care, greater professional career development, higher living standards and overall quality of life were cited as examples of “pull” factors.

Naturally, “pull” factors can be enhanced as a result of the posture of the receiving nation in encouraging such inflow of migrants whereby their desire to use foreign nationals in their economies is driven by labour needs, availability of land resources, overall economic opportunities and political liberalism.

As you would expect, Hong Kong has a number of “pull” factors which attract highly skilled immigrants from more than 120 economies into our economy, and the people who have gone through the process of migration to the HKSAR generally agree these include the following:

1. Geographical location, especially its proximity to mainland China.

2. Excellent employment opportunities.

3. Relatively high salaries.

4. Low rates of tax.

5. Easy and efficient immigration procedures.

6. Excellent telecoms.

7. A largely bi/trilingual workforce.

8. Low risk of terrorism.

9. The rule of law.

10. Low level of overt racism.

In recent years, Hong Kong has introduced specific immigration programmes to encourage these “pull” factors including the Admission of Mainland Talents Scheme, the Quality Migrants Admission Scheme, the Immigration Arrangements for Non-local Graduates and the Capital Investment Entrant Scheme. All other immigration is managed under the General Employment Policy and the policy in respect of family dependent relationships.

Related Posts for Further Reading

The 7 things your employer needs to know about getting a visa for you to work in Hong Kong

What are you really buying from a Hong Kong immigration consultant?

How onerous is the sponsorship role in a Hong Kong investment visa application?

What do both Hong Kong employment and investment visa applications share in common?

STOP PRESS! Hitler’s HKSAR passport application has been rejected!

What is the Condition Precedent for Defacto Spouses In Securing a Prolonged Visitor Visa for Hong Kong?

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Family Visas, Hadley Says… / 3 responses

First Published 27th June 2013

In Hong Kong, unmarried heterosexual life partners who share their lives as defacto spouses can’t apply for a dependent visa for the non principal visa holding partner.

Instead they have to reply on a positive act of discretion of the Director of Immigration via an application for a prolonged visitor visa issued on an out of policy basis.

The prolonged visitor visa doesn’t actually exist as an official visa type like the employment, investment, student, QMAS and other categories do.

Rather the prolonged visitor visa is the response of the Immigration Department in recognizing the need for genuine, non-traditional families not to be separated just because they don’t confirm to an archetypical family construct.

Consequently, whilst this prolonged  ‘slippers and pipe’ visa given to the trailing partner does afford the ability to be physically present in Hong Kong, it doesn’t, unfortunately allow any of the normal privileges that go with the   dependant visa.

So, no ability to work, study or join in a business.

Apart from the need for the normal dependant visa type criteria to be satisfied en route to approval of such a prolonged visitor visa (such as prior cohabitation before the application and the ability for the sponsoring partner to show he can put a roof over the applicant’s head and food on her table) the couple need to be able to demonstrate that they are both free to marry, but choose not to.

So, if one of the parties is still legally married to an ex partner, the prolonged visitor visa is simply not going to fly.

More Stuff to Help You Along

What Hong Kong visa options exist for unmarried trailing partners?

Is the ‘Shenzhen Shuttle’  a good way to extend your Hong Kong visitor visa?

Blended, unmarried, non traditional family with school age kids – what Hong Kong visa choices exist?

I have an employment visa and want to bring my girlfriend to Hong Kong  so what are our visa options?

Understanding the procedure for a same sex partner visa applicatrion in Hong Kong

How to Get a Hong Kong Entrepreneur Visa Approved – The Inside Scoop – Getting Approved

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Investment Visas, Musing / 5 responses

On December 10, 2015 I gave a talk at Centre O Connect in Sheung wan setting out the nitty gritty of the Hong Kong entrepreneur visa since the implementation of the Enhancement Measures on May 6, 2015.

In this segment, I discuss the criteria in play to anticipate an approval under the Business Investment Visa. Here, also, are the 10 Must Have Resources discussed in the talk, along with a synopsis of the various accredited programmes found here.

More In This Series

Introduction

How Did We Get Here?

Startup vs. Entrepreneur

Getting Approved

The Question of Money

Passing the Approvability Test

Improve Your Chances

D-I-Y Application

 

Other Relevant Content

How To Apply for a Hong Kong Business Investment Visa Without Any Professional Help

Hong Kong Entrepreneur Visa (Business Investment) – A Practical Guide

Is the Hong Kong Startup Visa All That It’s Cracked Up to Be?

Hong Kong Visa Handbook – The Entrepreneur Visa

All The Basics You Need To Know About Food In Hong Kong.

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Feature Article, Musing / No responses

All the basics you need to know about food in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong is a foodie city, but if you don’t know what you’re looking for, it can be a little complicated!

Coming to Hong Kong For The First Time?

INVITATION: Free Startup Academy Session – Setting Up Your New Company In Hong Kong @ The Headquarters Cowork on 27th February

Posted by The Visa Geeza / in Employment Visas, Investment Visas, Musing / No responses

The Hong Kong Visa Centre has partnered with Neat and Zegal for the new Startup Academy. The Academy will focus on setting up your new company in Hong Kong.

 

Join us for our Startup Academy session on 27th February!

Stephen Barnes, Co-Founder of Hong Kong Visa Centre will discuss the challenges start-up enterprises and other relatively new SME businesses face in securing the permission of the Hong Kong Immigration Department for their foreign national founders and core talent to come, live and work in the HKSAR.

David Rosa, Co-Founder & CEO of Neat will talk about one of the biggest frustrations for startups setting up in Hong Kong, opening a corporate bank account.

Oliver Boote, Marketing Manager of Zegal will give some practical tips for startup founders looking to draft a Shareholders Agreement.

Free beer & pizza will be provided for all in attendance!

 

RSVP        Here

Date          Wednesday, 27 February 2019

Time         6:30 PM – 8:30 PM HKT

Venue       The Headquarters Cowork, 2A, Cheung Hing Industrial Building, 12P Smithfield, Kennedy Town

Map          Here