Job Discussion Forums

[Wicked Stepmother]

Thanks for your comments everyone. Just to clarify, I did not enter China using the invitation letter and FEC. I therefore have not applied for a visa for the first job. Therefore I have not got a residence permit in Hubei. I changed my mind before all this.
Sadly, I am too poor to send a 'gift' to anyone. The Jiangsu employer and the agency are telling me to sort this out, but if the Hubei people will not comply, I am stuck. And they have been advertising for new staff, so if they have a quota of teachers they can accept, why they don't cancel is beyond me. Except they are determined I do not work elsewhere.
I just had a feeling about them before travelling that made me think again. I see now that I was probably right, but wish I had taken the job anyway.

[backtochina2017]

"the salient point is that once any school completes an online application which is then approved and it has reached someones desk at the provincial office and they have issued the invitation letter, no other school (no matter whether the same or a different province) can get another one without it being canceled"

To my understanding, if you go from school to school you don't need an invitation letter. If you are out of your country for example, college graduate, never been to China, then you need an invitation letter.

If an invitation letter is needed every time you get a residence permit, then I am mistaken, but I never saw this during my visits to the PSB with my school. They had the FEC instead. That to me seems like this mystery puzzle piece in this.

"The FEC (small booklet as you said) is returned not to the PSB but to the issuing office for cancellation, they then issue you a cancellation letter which you pass on to your new employer. It has a unique tracking number and is barcoded."

Well, I remember going to the Shijiazhuang Public Security Bureau, 石家庄市公安局

I didn't work in Shijiazhuang though. I worked in a different city in the Hebei prefecture but had to get the cancellation letter in Shijiazhuang which my old school refused to go get for me. Believe me, I remember the 6 hour train trip standing from 8pm to 2am on the train.

When I got there it seemed even bigger than the Beijing PSB and there were foreigners with Chinese people as well as foreigners on their own like me. The whole process took like 10 minutes at most.

I see the OP has commented. I will give my slant on it because I still see hope.

[backtochina2017]

[Wicked Stepmother]

[hz88]

I don't want to get into a battle about this as we seem to be going around in loops.

The last twelve months have seen considerable changes to the system, at the moment quite frankly its up in the air. No 'one fits all' rule applies. You could say in China that 'you can't but you can' but nowadays its getting harder to find workarounds.

When I give answers, it is based on factual information as part of my job. I have seen these situations time and time again. It does get frustrating that I have to keep repeating myself.

For the OP, the situation is if outside China, either get the documents canceled or let them expire, if in China then it is not going to make much of a difference, they still need to be canceled. This entails some negotiation with the issuing school. At a push you could contact the Foreign Experts Bureau that issued the letter pleading your case but in my experience they will mostly take the schools side.

Not wishing to take sides but I understand the OP's situation and I understand the schools situation. The school will have gone to considerable time and expense in the first place. One of my biggest bugbears is 'no shows', the hassles left to clear up are not minor so my sympathy is not very forthcoming in that respect.

If in China, the OP will have another visa, not a resident permit which will expire at some point. The only way to come back with a z visa would be with the invitation letter which she can't get because of the already active one. A never ending circle.

[backtochina2017]

[backtochina2017]

"The only way to come back with a z visa would be with the invitation letter which she can't get because of the already active one."

That's mere conjecture. There is no factual evidence of someone getting an invitation letter, leaving the country and not being allowed to enter on new Z visa (or first one if they did things illegal).

If you can only be in the country for 30 days to process the paperwork, then it would expire. Anyone can change their visa or extend it an additional 30 days. At which point you could then submit new documents. This to me seems like the worst of worst scenarios, that you have to wait a few weeks for the invitation letter to expire to get a new one.

However, I would not be surprised if you had the fortitude and motivated yourself without feeling sorry for yourself, that you could go to another province, go to the authorities and make a case that you will never work with a school (Hubei in this case) and that you have a current employer who needs a teacher.

An officer in Province B is not going to care about what officers in Province A are saying. They see someone in their area needs a teacher, and the teacher needs the school. It's a match!!

At the end of the day, I would rather throw a few hundred RMB, get rejected and then leave the country than leave the country not knowing that I could have stayed in the country. Had I left in summer of 2014, I would never have worked from 2014 to 2015. That was a direct result of my school telling me to hang in their and get the cancellation letter myself.

The invitation letter is not the Z visa. It merely states that an individual can apply for the Z visa now. Any recruiter can take copies of the teacher's documents and get an invitation letter without the teacher's consent. However, the teacher has to go in person and authorize getting the Z visa.

When you get a new residence permit, the same type of thing happens. You have to be present with your school.

I am not convinced an invitation letter alone binds a teacher to a school, it only shows intent by the recruiter and school. If you have to give the recruiter these documents just to be considered for a job, it doesn't mean you actually accepted the job. There has to be a contract also.

This is another sticky point. They give you 4 pages or so and tell you to sign the last page. However, when they submit the first pages they could submit a different contract and just attach the last page which you signed. Does this mean you are tied to those contract terms? In a business sense, you are bound by what the school agrees to, but how this ties you to the visa is not clear.

One last point, and then I'll post less in the future. Not all schools are close to the authorities. I have witnessed arguments between Chinese schools and authorities because the school didn't have the proper licensing to hire teachers. This delayed things and pissed off the school.

So don't assume that because one school (Hubei in this case) is refusing to help the teacher that all authorities in China are going to cave in and support what the school is doing. You could see one officer one day who doesn't like the signature you put down. Next time you go, the new officer is now worried more about your stamps in your passport. Keep going to them and go with the school. Eventually, someone is going to let you get the visa.

Good luck to all

[asiannationmc]

[backtochina2017]

"It would seem that the officers of both provinces will be entering information on the same computer network system (China wide .. who knows?)...could it be that entries for invitation letters are tied to passport numbers?"

Ok, and for what purpose? Eventually all that computer stuff has got to get to a human in charge. They make the final decision.

If you were that person, and you got a phone call from a recruiter who wanted to get a new Z visa for a teacher, would you allow this based on what the computer spit out? (I am assuming no)

Now, instead of a recruiter on the phone, you had an employer and teacher come in and talk directly to you showing you a soon to be expiring L visa (which I assume the teacher in this case would have), that invitation letter would no longer be usable when the teacher leaves the country. What are they going to do? Enter China on an L visa, leave the country, and then re-enter again on an L visa? If so, then they could do that with a new school. It also sounds like illegal teaching.

The officer would also have knowledge that there is no residence permit. Wouldn't that be a scarier thing than a "ghost invitation letter" in the background? The officer would have to be more concerned about a foreigner in the country nearing their expiration of stay and want to find a legal way to either keep them in the country or a legal way to get them out of the country.

Yes, if you or I walked up to them alone and made our case they would see we didn't have an employer. However, if you go with your employer the officer can think "Well, here is a school and here is a teacher, let's make this legal and legit."

If not, the school will come back again with another teacher. That officer will have to ok it at some point. I could understand if the teacher worked 6 months on a Z visa and had a residence permit, they are tied to that employer for 6 more months, but without anything other than an L visa if it is that easy to get invitation letters Chinese authorities will soon be canceling them if they aren't already. That is the loophole then. I can't imagine an officer ok'ing that and I have never seen an officer do such. If this new system allows for it then it opens the door for non-native English speakers.

"I believe that a work visa is tied directly to a particular business or institution ..."

My understanding is the teacher doesn't have a work visa. They came to China on a tourist visa (from what I am surmising "I did not enter China using the invitation letter and FEC"), got the physical before going to Hubei (previous job in China? My guess is no), and applied for the work permit/invitation letter so they would go do a Hong Kong trip to get the Z visa. That's my guess from the missing pieces of the puzzle. There is no mention of a Z visa in the passport which would negate what I stated, and there is logical evidence from their wording that they have entered China on something (L visa? Student visa?).

[asiannationmc]

[backtochina2017]

[backtochina2017]

On another note, I am in discussion now with another recruiter who doesn't know about my plans to go to a school she isn't recruiting for. She is telling me to get her all the documents so she can apply for the invitation letter and work permit we have been discussing here.

However, she hasn't told me about the school!!! LOL

The OP is correct, beware. If this recruiter is just going to apply without some agreed school, what does that say about the power of the invitation letter?

[asiannationmc]

[asiannationmc]

I would consider the passport number and if applying with a new passport would slide by.....however, in my experience don't hold your breath .. I lost a passport on a motorcycle trip in Vietnam when a mud slide took me out....Not being able to have the Chin'er Embassy in V.N. issue another Z as they were not able .. I took an L (China tourist)and went through the "heck" of trying to get N.V. to cooperate and issue an extension so as to not violate the V.N. visa period....took three weeks to sort it out. I had no visa to speak of at this time in Vietnam and the funny thing is I was able to fly without a passport on the airlines that serviced Vietnam in country.. and with the em emergency passport and a new L visa I finely caught the big bird back to the PRC ...arrived in H.K. to a overwhelming interrogation as to why I had left China on one passport number but was returning on another...same thing happen when I arrived in Beijing.... so even though I was issued a new passport number, they had my number....although in the end, and with a lot of paperwork police reports and other drivel I was able to convert the L directly to a residence permit, the Foreign work permit did not have to be replaced..

[backtochina2017]

"just for future reference, "OJ" logic to be valid in use, there must have fit and acquit or some facsimile, for your purposes try what I always tell the police, tats my story and I'm sticking to it..."

I am sorry, I don't know what that means. Fit and acquit or some facsimile?

If it is a real process maybe you can explain, if it is some inside joke/insult (perhaps British humor?) I have better things to do with my time.

"I's not sure a recruiter can request an invitation letter without a sponsoring school"

If the school needs a teacher, then they provide their paperwork, no?

"so I am assuming that this is a case of being locked out of the input function ... if the system is nation wide"

What if people just don't show up for a public school? That school needs a teacher. This opens up a loophole where you are issuing more invitation letters than actual teachers going to that school. This is my point. I honestly and sincerely don't think invitation letters can be that much of an issue. Now, if the FEC was already processed then I could see something more nationwide attributed to the teacher. I hope it works out either way. It will be interesting to see what non-native English teachers try to do to get around the new restrictions.