WARNING: APRC Applications Now Require Appointments...in Level 2

Hi. I’m currently calling to ask you if the info on your own site is correct and accurate.

:face_with_raised_eyebrow:

Well. Guess I am only doing this once and letting you guys know my experience. It didn’t even cross my mind that an appointment may be necessary.

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You never know! I’m doing it for the third time later this week!

If that’s what I think it means, congrats!

It was 5 years ago, hence the APRC application, but thanks anyway! May you also be making more APRC applications in your future!

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It should be a NTC thing. Not for TC, as @afterspivak posted.

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Good to hear you’re getting your APRC @Marco :happyrunningaround:

In Taoyuan at least, when I got mine a few years ago, an appointment was required (I remember that they had only one APRC rep at the time). I don’t know the situation now in the Peach Garden.

I imagine the majority of applications go through Taipei or NTC so perhaps there are more reps and usually not a need for appointments? Or, like you mentioned, probably a lack of communication on their part. Shocking, I know. /s

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I’ve only ever done NIA things in Taipei Taipei. This was my first time in Zhonghe doing it.

In Hualien last week put in my application without an appointment. Was told need 4 weeks to complete.

A strange thing happened the day after I submitted my application. While in the office the immigration officer showed me a table with my arrivals dates. I did not examine closely but in last 10 years not that much travel so seemed right. I assumed she was only interested in more recent arrivals. However, the next day the immigration officer called my mobile phone which was answered by my wife. She said she wanted to confirm an arrival in 1990. She asked if I was working at company XXX which my wife confirmed as correct (but was actually not correct as started at that company in 1992). The officer said their records back at that time were not so good.

1990? Wow. I really did not expect them to care about arrivals 30 years ago. I guess could tell them my first entry was 1987…and been in and out of Taiwan at least 50 times.

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Lol, had no idea. Back in march I just walked into NIA in Nantou with the documents.
They did not mention anything. Just filled out the forms and that was it. :sweat_smile:
There was no wait either. Nobody besides me was in there at that time.

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May I remind you that for years -YEARS!- the address for NIA’s New Taipei location was NOT updated in their English website? Many a poor soul thought it was a stone’s throw from the Banciao station, almost next door to Far Eastern mall …only to embark in a trip if disappointment.

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I had this too.

I was in the Nanjing road area so I took the 307 to Jisui

In your case @Marco , the decision will be fast I suspect, and either of two ways -

  • Quick - give it to him now on the condition that he stops complaining about foreigner discrimination;
  • No way - look at this huge file we already have on him, compiled by various departments over the years, complaining about this and that - lets knock him back and escort him to the Airport fast.

Seriously, good luck, hope all goes well.

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New Taipei always need an appointment since 2015. Only one officer available for whole NTP City, i.e. Miss Chu. She is straightforward though, will not stray from unnecessary questions. Income requirement and tax payment, that pretty much it.

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I just gave the lady all the papers and said here you go! That’s all of it.

I aint stoppin till I got me Triple Citizenship in my hands.

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I regret not looking more closely at that document. The immigration officer just seemed to show it to me for confirmation which I signed. I just thought she would be more clear about my arrivals than myself unless I looked through my passports.

I thought you had to renounce any others as part of the application process? Or has that changed?

Workin on that.

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It’s not unrealistic, tbh. Welcome to TW! :blush:One year when I went to file taxes when i lived in the middle of nowhere, the website specifically said, in English and Chinese, that the foreign tax filing time went from 8:30-4:30 with no break for lunch. I arrive at 12:30 (on my lunch break) and the place is empty, except a security guard. When I tell them that the website says the foreigner filing doesn’t have a lunch break, explicitly separate from the Taiwan nationals filing times, they interrupt the nap of the women in charge of foreigner filing to come downstairs and help me. Which either made me an asshole because I was interrupting her lunch (she’s the only person who does it, so that means she twiddles her thumbs most of the day but the doesn’t get a break) or she’s an asshole because her job description is “stay at your desk during lunch” and she decided she wanted a lunch break, leaving me frustrated that no one was there during the times listed online. And because there are so few foreigners, I got a lot of “oh you’re that foreigner who interrupted my break”, every year after.

TLDR: you’ve lived here long enough to know websites in this country aren’t well-made or always accurate.

But thank for you the heads up to everyone about the appointment-making need!

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