Another holiday for me?

I recently stopped working for the cram school that supplied my work permit. When I phoned and asked MOFA, it seemed I had 7 days after cancellation of my ARC to leave the country. I dutifully complied and had a great three week holiday in Thailand. At the Taiwan rep. office there though, they told me that my visa was still valid and that I could just come and go as I pleased and that in any event there was nothing they could do about it while my passport said the visa was valid. So i’m now back in Taiwan, and rather confused. (1) Since my school cancelled my work permit, does that automatically cancel my multiple entry visa ? (2) Does the time I was out the country count as overstay because I couldn’t come in on a “fresh” visitor visa ? (3) Is there any way I can convert to a student visa for the Chinese classes I’m taking at the moment without leaving the country again? (4) Well done on a great site: a life-saver for foreigners living here.

I will try and answer some of your questions, but hopefully Richard will read this and correct me if I get anything wrong.

(0)I recently stopped working for the cram school that supplied my work permit.

Did you complete your contract? If you left before your contract was completed you will have been blacklisted.

(1) Since my school cancelled my work permit, does that automatically cancel my multiple entry visa ?

Your Multiple Entry Permit runs concurrent with your ARC. When your ARC expires, so does the visa. Normally your ARC expires when your Work Permit is cancelled.

(2) Does the time I was out the country count as overstay because I couldn’t come in on a “fresh” visitor visa ?

I don’t understand how you got back in if your ARC had expired?? I am as confused as you are:-)

(3) Is there any way I can convert to a student visa for the Chinese classes I’m taking at the moment without leaving the country again?

You can not ‘convert’. You need to be here on a Visitors Visa, and apply for extensions. More info on this on the Oriented site http://www.oriented.org/legal/VISA-2.shtml

I know this is probably not a great deal of help, good luck.


Regards
John
taiwanteacher.bizland.com
taiwan_teacher@hotmail.com
Kaohsiung

Thanks for the advice

The reason I could come back into the country is that as far as the Taiwan office in Thailand can tell I have a valid re-entry permit until the 14th of April, and even though my boss says she cancelled the work permit, I still have all the documentation I had when I was working there, i.e. an ARC card and multiple entry permit in my passport.

The first thing I’m worried about is the possibility of getting blacklisted when I quit the bu xi ban by following the letter of the contract, which asked for 2 months notice, which I complied with? However, this doesn’t seem to have happened and I’m still on good terms with my former employer.

More confusing still is what the police told me:
You can e-mail me to find out more, but it seems almost incredible to me, and I think there may be problems down the line. But for the moment I’m still here.

If you break your contract with a school…maybe I should use dissolve…and follow the contract to the small print (give them one months notice etc etc)…can the school be spiteful and still black list you so stopping you working in any other school in taiwan