First time poster, long time lurker. Just took a job in Taiwan. Lot of dialogue back and forth and finally a contract for me to sign. They told me I needed to cover my visa fees. I got visa and work permit confused when they told me they were actually going to pay for the permit. I thought that was taken care of until my boss asked me if I have 6300NT in cash to pay for the visa.
They just told me I’ll need 3200NT also for my ARC. That was not stated anywhere in the contract. Maybe I’m overreacting. Is this normal? Do foreign workers usually have to pay for their visa and arc? I am requesting help on the matter.
I’m technically working at the school for free. Started on Monday. The kids are awesome. Staff is quite decent. I don’t want to disappoint them, but I also need to make sure I’m not getting duped. Please help.
Well, think about it this way…the school is willing and able to sponsor you, but are asking you to cover the costs of sponsoring you. If it were a job in your home country, it’s almost like, “Hey the job is yours, but I’m going to need you to pay for a 300USD application form and all your office supplies” The two just don’t really add up, do they?
Unfortunately, this is not uncommon practice among some of the cram schools and even some companies.
I will let our resident legal adviser @yyy handle what your next step should be.
I’m working for an organization to works with the govt in placing teachers in schools.
The contract does state that I need to cover the cost of my visa fees. My confusion came when they spoke of the work permit. I got the two confused and thought the visa was going to be paid for by them in the end.
So I made the mistake by really not asking more questions.
The arc situation is funny. That’s nowhere in the contract at all. I’ll await more responses, including your friend’s. I really appreciate this.
Might be different for teachers, but I’ve always had to pay for my own ARC fees, including the 10,000 NT for my APRC. Not sure why you have to pay for a visa, however, because if you have an ARC you should not need a visa. Unless I’m missing something?
I want to say the ARC fees were about 1000 NT/year, but I could be wrong.
To my understanding, the visa you speak of, is this your landing visa? I’m not sure what passport you’re holding and you do not have to share this info if you do not feel the need to. However, with my passport, I needed a landing visa, NOT a visa exempt stamp, on my passport in order to swiftly apply for a work permit/ARC.
Apologies, I may have read your OP a little quick. If they’re asking you to pay for the visa, I don’t see a much you can do here, since you said it was in your contract and you signed it. Just kind of sucks since it’s a pretty big sum of moneyz. However, having you pay for your ARC is something that the company/school should be taking care of, all you need to be doing here is providing passport sized pictures, filling in info and signing/initialing on the dotted line.
I did sign unfortunately. I have a u.s. passport. The visa I’m talking about is my work visa. That is what they want me to pay for. I’m guessing my work visa and the arc process.
work permit fee is 500, I suppose the company had paid it for you
I assume you have arrived with a landing visa(visa exempt)
6300NT is the price for getting a visitor visa for USA passport holders, these prices for visa can be found at MOFA website.
3200NT includes fee for changing visitor visa into resident visa, and fee for ARC, both can be done at local immigration office.
Work permit - visitor visa - resident visa - ARC
It is standard procedures of getting required documents to work in Taiwan, I think the problem is, whoever recruits you here did not mention any of this…
Huerta is totally right. I imagine you came here on a visa exempt, right? Hence the 6300nt to go from visa exempt to visitor visa.
As far as I know, a lot of schools (if not most, at least buxibans) only cover the work permit, leaving the residency permit costs to the teacher. As far as companies go, the first one I worked for made me pay for my own ARC (they were as cheap as it gets) and made me renew it every year, the others I’ve worked for since all covered the cost and always applied for 3-year permits. YMMV.
I can’t thank you enough for all the info provided. That’s crazy that the visa needs to be changed over. While I take responsibility for not digging deeper into this whole situation, I kind of feel like it’s a rip off.
I guess now it all comes down to if I’ feel it’s worth it. Gotta think. Thanks again everyone.
Honorable Ranlee has graciously attributed to my worthless self a title too lofty.
Working without a work permit (or exemption) is something no employer should ever ask you to do, even though lots of them do.
There used to be a sticky going on for pages and pages explaining this kind of stuff and also iirc explaining that we shouldn’t call a visa exemption a “landing visa” because that’s something completely different.
Just wanted to come back and say thank you to everyone who sent me a message in regards to my visa issues. I ended up paying for it, but I do love my job, so it all worked out. Thanks again, everyone.
