Immigration Headaches for APRC parents in Taiwan

I have shared this with my students and Facebook posts, so I better also share to a wider audience. The current Taiwanese immigration system is like most, flawed, confusing and in need of reform. Long standing APRC holders who have been a positive influence in Taiwan are being punished along with their family members because nothing has been done to improve current laws.

My friend Toby is a perfect example of an upstanding long term expat whose family is suffering under the current immigration system. Tomorrow he is meeting with Taiwanese immigration to see if they can change his son's visa from 90 days to 180. Watch this video posted September 9th.

My friend's son will be 20 soon and they are trying to figure it out. Basically if I am still here when my daughter Z is 20, she is no longer my dependent and yet cannot apply for an APRC herself. She can't legally work here despite being in the school system since preschool. She would have to do Hong Kong runs to renew her tourist visa, or stay as a student under a student visa. But perhaps if I transfer her visa before she turns 20 I might be able to secure something. Ask a different immigration officer and you get a different answer.

There is a FB group Foreigners for Taiwan Immigration and the private Taiwan DREAM group for parents. On one of the most recent DREAM posts (Sept 10), supposedly there is a new law, that no one including the immigration officers know about, which is confusing. The father whose 20 year old got an ARC dependency status recommended an immigration officer named Eric who was willing to help anyone in this situation. A month before his son turned 20 he turned in the paperwork that his son has been living in Taiwan for 10 years and applied for a Dependency ARC, but apparently this only works if you transfer an existing visa, not if your child has already been enduring visa runs, like my friend Tobie. [NIA Officer Eric Chen. 886-7-623-6334 E-mail: eric817@immigrations.gov.tw.]

There has been a petition in the past, and since this law isnt' legit for every child of an APRC holder, I am thinking of organizing a letter campaign with my students to write to the main immigration office. Taiwanese people need to stand up for long-term foreign friends and call elected officials to rewrite some of the current immigration laws. Here is an excellent article published September 10th to share with your Taiwanese friends.
 

Congrats to me! I'm Legal!

After 5 years of legitimate, tax paying work, a foreigner can apply for their much coveted APRC (Alien Permanent Resident Card). The benefit being I can work anywhere, like a Taiwanese person without being a slave to a school for their sponsoring my ARC (Alien Resident Card) and reapplying every year. I could of applied in September 2013, but I was saving for our visas and plane ticket to Myanmar the beginning of 2014 for Chinese New Year and simply didn't have the extra 10,000NT ($340 USD) lying around. My Chinese teacher Kevin couldn't stand it anymore and in March lend me the money which I quickly paid back. Then in April I was finally holding my APRC in my hand. I have the option of going home right now and coming back in 183 days without changing my legal, working status. I can also apply for a 2 year leave and return with the same status.

The morning I received my APRC

The story doesn't end there. Immigration didn't tell me, but through friends I learned I still wasn't "legal", I had to apply for a Work Permit, that fortunately only cost me 100NT. It was easy, I could apply from Tainan and send everything to Taipei. My work permit just came in yesterday! It took 2 working weeks to process.