Another marriage/visa question

I also came on a tourist visa and exchanged it for a visa based on a work permit. after one year I exchanged that one for a JFRV with no problems.

Dear lysfjord
I can assure you that you can come in on a visitors visa and then change it over to a JFRV later in Taiwan. Because I came in on a visitors visa and changed it over to a JFRV. If you have all the required documents the process is quite quick. Important to remember, once married in your country have the marriage certificate translated and have them both certified at the taiwan trade office of your country. Also do the same with the Police check.
Here is what you need. I hope it’s helpful to you.
Best of luck.

Joining Family Resident Visa (JFRV)

  1. Statement of clean Criminal Record Documentation, with Translation & Certified at the nearest Overseas ROC Mission office of your country.

  2. Proof that your Marriage is Legally Registered in the country of the foreign spouse. This also needs to be certified at the nearest overseas mission. Once this is completed, have the marriage registered in Taipei, and have the foreign spouse added to the Household Registration.

  3. Get a Health Check Certificate at a large public hospital. (Renai Hospital, on Renai Rd, on corner of Da an Rd.) Takes one week.

  4. Passport

  5. 2 passport size photo

Yes, the info posted by Peter Au is all correct. It’s the same process I followed.

Ok. So although the visitor visa actually is supposed to be non-extendable, this doesn’t matter? Or will the request for a JFRV be considered an application for an extendable visa?

Also, another tricky one. I will need a ticket out of Taiwan to get a visitor visa, but I’m not really planning to leave since I will be changing to the JFRV once I get here. Will I have to book an open ticket to HK, or is there a better solution for this?

A visitor visa is non-extendable but you are not extending, you are applying for a new different kind of visa.

You can also get a 6-day extendable visitors visa. If they don’t give you one try a different office. It depends where you are.

You don’t need a plane ticket out of Taiwan to get a visa either. I’ve done it twice. But if they insist (again it depends where you are), buy a ticket, cancel it and loose some money. If you do that from Taiwan, it costs NT$ 800.

Brian

Thought I should post one more time to end this thread and provide a complete answer if anyone else came into my situation.

I did not need a return ticket as I explained my situation to the trade office in Norway and showed them my Norwegian marriage certificate. They gave me a 60 days tourist visa which should be enough to complete the paperwork over here.

I also read somewhere that the Clean Criminal Record Documentation could be presented in English. My Government could provide it in English, so it saved me some translation costs.

The marriage certificate still has to be translated, but it does not need to be done by an authorized translator. You can do it yourself as long as you fill in a form and get the Taiwan Trade Office to certify this as well.

I’ve almost completed the process of getting my JFRV now. Something that really delayed everything is a document that is not mentioned in any discussions on Forumosa.

Before getting married we both had to get single certificates from our country’s respective population registers. Fair enough. Knew about that. However, after marriage I also had to show a document from the Norwegian population registry that we were married! The marriage certificate was not enough! The office admitted that if my country didn’t have a central population register. It wouldn’t be required. So I guess the need for this depends on your nationality.

Of course, I didn’t know about that before I had left the country, so it took me about 3 weeks to get it fixed.

The MOFA fee has increased to NT$3,000, and once you get the passport from them you have to go to the police station to apply for the spouse ARC. (And pay another NT$1,000).

It actually was mentioned in the archives :

[quote]II. Those who are married overseas:

Certificate of Marriage authenticated by a R.O.C. overseas mission
[/quote]

That’s not the same.

Sure, the marriage certificate had to be translated and authenticated by a Taiwanese overseas mission. But the Taiwanese overseas mission ALSO wanted to see a document from the population registry proving that we were married.

[quote]But the Taiwanese overseas mission ALSO wanted to see a document from the population registry proving that we were married.[/quote]Off course you can’t just take in your marriage certificate that the priest gave you into the TECO. You need to register your marriage first at the 'Department of Births, Death and Marriages (or in your case, population registry). Even though that should be common knowledge, it is in the archives too.

Maybe I should be a bit more thorough.

When I write “marriage certificate” I mean the paper that was notarized by the public registrar. (Publicus Notarius or whatever he is called). We didn’t get married in a church, we got married in the notary public office.

  1. Get single certificates from your population registry office.
  2. Get married.
  3. Get the marriage certificate stamped by your notary public office.
  4. Send the marriage certificate to your foreign ministry to be approved. It gets stamped and sent back to you.
  5. Since you are now married, you have to get a certificate that shows that you are no longer single. You get this from the population registry office. (IF such an office exists in your country). (THIS IS THE DOCUMENT I HAVE NOT READ ABOUT IN THE ARCHIVES)
  6. Both the marriage certificate and the certificate from your population registry has to be translated to Chinese.

Then comes the CCRD, health check and so on…

[quote]5. Since you are now married, you have to get a certificate that shows that you are no longer single. You get this from the population registry office. (IF such an office exists in your country). (THIS IS THE DOCUMENT I have NOT READ ABOUT IN THE ARCHIVES)
[/quote]

If you have the marriage certificate, you don’t need another certificate proving that you are single. Who told you that? They’re wrong. It’s not a Ministry of Foreign Affairs requirement.

Brian

[quote=“Sir Donald Bradman”]If you have the marriage certificate, you don’t need another certificate proving that you are single. Who told you that? They’re wrong. It’s not a Ministry of Foreign Affairs requirement.

Brian[/quote]You need to prove you are single before were married, that is why it used to be (still is ?) better to get married in your home country, whilst they are happy to marry you without it, you can’t regisiter it in Taiwan. Which left some people in the position of having to get divorced and marry again so they can live in Taiwan

The ROC overseas mission in Norway told me. This document stopped the whole process of getting our marriage approved in Taiwan for about 3 weeks! I think I got all the emails from the ROC office documenting this demand as well.

But like I wrote earlier. This might be a requirement for some countries, not all countries.

I believe the population registry in Norway is similar to the Household registration office in Taiwan. They need to see my name on the Taiwanese household registration of my wife to give me the “spouse ARC”. So maybe they also want to see my wife’s name in the Norwegian population registry?

Right. I got it now. The document you’re talking about is not some kind of ‘single certificate’ it’s the marriage registration in your home country.

It used to be that if you got married in Taiwan you needed to prove that your marriage was registered in your home country (whether or not your country had a registrar of marriages). Now it says that if you are from a country that doesn’t have a system of marriage registration then the marriage certificate is all you need. Still it seems very strange that with a marriage certificate from your home country you still needed that proof of registration.

Did you actually go into the MOFA office in Taipei and try and get a JFRV without the marriage reistration proof? I’m curious.

Brian

[quote]1. Get single certificates from your population registry office.
2. Get married.
3. Get the marriage certificate stamped by your notary public office.
4. Send the marriage certificate to your foreign ministry to be approved. It gets stamped and sent back to you.
5. Since you are now married, you have to get a certificate that shows that you are no longer single. You get this from the population registry office. (IF such an office exists in your country). (THIS IS THE DOCUMENT I have NOT READ ABOUT IN THE ARCHIVES)
6. Both the marriage certificate and the certificate from your population registry has to be translated to Chinese.[/quote] See, where you are loosing me is at step 3. This is where you should have registered the marriage. The step 4 should be to take it to the public notary. Step 5 is the foreign ministry. I also got married at a public register, and she was very specific to me to take that marriage certificate to the registration office before I go to TECO.

No. It was the ROC overseas office in Norway that wanted to see this document.

Amos:
Maybe it’s just less bureacratic in Norway? Once I got married at the notary public, that was it. I never heard anything about having to register in a marriage register, but I guess the public notary made sure I got listed in it. (Which makes sense - why should I have to do that when they got all the data needed anyway)

Just because it makes sense does not mean that it will be acceptable to the Taiwan government authorities.

Taiwan govt has a book about requirements for each country regarding proof of marriage and free to marry. Hence the rules vary from country to country. For instance you cannot get a “free to marry” certificate in the US, so you are allowed to present a afidavit. In New Zealand you can get one, so you have to get it to satisfy the Taiwan authorities.