I have been with my Taiwanese partner for the last 8 years and last year I relocated to Kaohsiung with her and I am here on Taiwan Gold Card. We plan to have a life here and I would like to be in a permanent ‘place’ that recognizes my union with her. I am from a country which doesn’t recognize same-sex marriage.
Is there anyone with a Taiwanese partner who is able to share your experience in getting married, and also detail what is the process to get started. After marriage, is it possible to work in Taiwan for straight couples? I heard conflicting views.
Would appreciate if you could point me to such resources or agencies that I can contact as well.
A high court on Thursday (May 6 [2021]) ruled that same-sex marriage between a Taiwanese citizen and a Macau national should be recognized in Taiwan, opening the door to marriages with others who come from countries where same-sex marriage is illegal. https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/news/4196648
Marriage registration for same sex couples is just as any other marriage. Since you have a Gold Card, you actually don’t need to switch to marriage based ARC (if your spouse is Taiwnese). Just get APRC with your gold card when it’s time.
If there are any issues you can try to contact Victoria Hsu, lawyer and co-founder of the Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights (TACPR).
TAPCPR has been representing defendants in quite a lot of anti-discrimination cases. Through these court cases, we hope to broaden the understanding of gender diversity in legal practices and set a benchmark for equality.
Hi! I got married to my wife about two years ago (also lesbian couple). You will need a document from your home country that proves you are single (this document has to be legalized by both the ministry of Foreign Affairs and TECO in your country. Additionally, if the document is not in English or Chinese, you need to translate it to one of these languages).
Then, you just grab your partner (bring their chop and ID) and go to the nearest household registration office. The paperwork is very quick, and it will take at most 20 minutes.
If you have any other questions, I’m happy to help.
I am currently taking the year out and also have been looking at the job front here. From what I see, salaries aren’t high here. I may not be able to renew the Taiwan Gold Card come the third year as mine was based on economic criteria that is salary that is more than NTD160,000/month, which currently is no longer the case here. So I may not be able to renew the gold card or apply for APRC.
However, I read in the forum that I could renew the gold card if I could show that I have a certain amount of savings in a Taiwan bank. This could be one option but I need to check this out.
Can’t you just switch to the job-seeking ARC after the three years then apply for an APRC from there? Seems like a better/safer/easier situation for you than basing it on marriage.
You cna also get a jfrv visa, which has essentially open work rights. Once married, that’s easy to do as well. Just depends on your situation which one you want.
Might want to check if switching starts your time back to zero for future APRC.
I did it. Was easy, just proof you’re not married in your home country and a few other docs and you can be married in 10 minutes. But my original country recognises same-sex marriage.
I naturalised as well.
This wasn’t allowed previously but there was talk of this problem being fixed. I’m not sure what the outcome of that was
That is my understanding as well i.e. switching to a work based ARC will lose the foreign professional status. Also, I don’t think I am eligible to apply for APRC after 3 years now since I am currently taking the first year out with no income. One needs to be employed in all three years.
And barring any inaccuracy in my understanding, if I manage to find suitable work with at decent pay here in the second year, I should able to then use Year 2 + Year 3 of Gold Card + Year 1 and Year 2 and Year 3 of work based ARC or marriage based ARC to count towards the 5 years’ requirement for APRC application.
I’m not sure where this is coming from, that you need to be employed in all three years? I wasn’t “employed” in any of the three years. Isn’t it just based on income in the final (tax/calendar) year?
For any job you’d find from the second year onwards, presumably you’d be looking to earn enough to meet the APRC requirement? (You’d need that in year 5 of the alternative approach anyway.)
Yes. You don’t need to be “employed” in Taiwan AFAIK, just demonstrate sufficient income in the previous year, for example by using the income tax certificate for that year. Mine was from freelance work for overseas clients.
There’s a whole separate thread about this, btw:
It tends to work out as a bit longer than three years because it takes some time to file taxes and get the tax certificate then to apply — for me I had my first three-year gold card from March 2020 to March 2023, got a second three-year gold card in January 2023, and in the end applied for the APRC in June or so after getting the tax certificate. For people with local employers, I think they can use alternative documents from the employer from January onwards to apply for the APRC, but I believe that isn’t an option for people with overseas employers/clients (if there’s a workaround, I’m not aware of it).
Right, in the calendar/tax year preceding the time of application after three years of residing here with the gold card (subject to the above).
So having a local employer would probably make things easier/faster in terms of the timeline, but it’s not a requirement. And prior to the last year, it doesn’t matter AFAIK.
The paperwork is very quick, and it will take at most 20 minutes.