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peewee1979 · Posted: Wed Dec 07, 2011 8:11 am Post subject: Do I need to be worried here?

Quick visa question. I have a Z visa that expires on Dec 11. That's 4 days away. The school is processing the FEC through the proper channels but did not receive the book yet.

So I have no resident permit as yet. The said once they get the book they take me to the PSB for the RP visa.

I have a scheduled meeting tomorrow and I will ask the fao the status.

Come 11:59 pm December 11 am I technically illegal?

My last inquiry of this matter brought about a response of "Don't Worry". Of course I do worry.

therock · Joined: 31 Jul 2005 Posts: 1266 Location: China

What has your incompetent school been doing for the last 25 or so days?

peewee1979 · Posted: Wed Dec 07, 2011 8:52 am Post subject:

ymmv · Joined: 14 Jul 2004 Posts: 387

As long as the RP application (with the FEC) are in the hands of the PSB by the expiry date, you're OK. The PSB will give you a receipt which will tide you over until they issue the new RP.

Lobster · Posted: Wed Dec 07, 2011 11:32 am Post subject:

If you don't get the FEC back in time you'll be in trouble and have to ask for a 30-day tourist visa. I don't know why schools always want to try to do things at the last minute. If, as noted, you get the app in before the expiry date, all is well.

RED

Baozi man · Joined: 06 Sep 2011 Posts: 214

Your situation depends on just where in the RP process your school is. If you have an FEC, etc. and your application for an RP has been handed in to the PSB, evinced by a numbered and dated receipt, no problem.

OTOH, if the people in your FAO office are bungling a timely application, you may be in trouble. What the PSB cares about is the timely application.

Even if your school has bungled your application, you may not need to worry. It depends on where you are and with who in the PSB your FAO has guanxi .

There is a monetary fine associated with visa violations. Unless your school has some big mojo, if the RP is late being applied for, someone is going to pay. If your school has guanxi or the PSB play nice [unlikely], the problem will go away.

People in school FAO offices often don't know what they are doing. After all, rarely are they punished for incompetence. In the case of incompetence which impacts a foreigner, they may even be commended.

If they try to make you pay fines because of their mistake, resist.

peewee1979 · Posted: Wed Dec 07, 2011 2:01 pm Post subject:

I'll remind them tomorrow of the importance of this issue.

w.melon56 · Joined: 11 Aug 2011 Posts: 31

choudoufu · Joined: 25 May 2010 Posts: 3325 Location: Mao-berry, PRC

peewee1979 · Posted: Wed Dec 07, 2011 2:32 pm Post subject:

umm I have a Z visa. leaving would be futile I think

Baozi man · Joined: 06 Sep 2011 Posts: 214

Melon, People sometimes blame the employer because it is their fault. In this province, an FT is not welcome in the provincial FAO's office nor in the PSB without a representative of their school. If the school appointee is unavailable to take care of these matters, what is the FT supposed to do?

Some FAOs are incompetent. I know. I've dealt with them. There really is not a lot that an FT can do if the people appointed to see them through the process are morons. I've sat in the back offices of the PSB writing an explanation and apology letter for the PSB when the mistake was entirely the school FAO. I checked with him for four weeks and it was still late. Why? Because each time the FAO of the province or the PSB wanted something, he would wait an entire week to take care of it. Time flies when you are dumb, you know?

When I would rattle the cage of the FAO, he would refer me to his underling, who was buried under a heavy load of teaching. He simply didn't have time to do such a time consuming job and teach a full load of classes, I guess.

Some of these school FAOs think the PSB is a joke like they are. They are wrong. The PSB are sticklers for detail, The FAOs are shocked that someone in China actually does their job in a professional (?) manner.

Typical Westerners can not conceive of the incompetence which characterizes so many facets of life here. Few would even imagine that the school FAO was simply sitting on your documents or letting a week pass because of a paper he forgot to provide someone. It's hard to imagine that a school hiring FTs would let their permit to hire FTs expire, but they do.

Do you know every document required by the FAO/PSB to complete the process? You know about the character attestation, multiple school permits, health document, and so forth? 8 different offices in the capital city to get the right documents for a school to legally FTs. Some of those documents may be required by the PSB when issuing the RP. Know where to get them? [content edit]

If you hand in your documents and they say they will take care of it and then 3 days before expiration, they tell you they haven't done it, you blame the FT for that? Sometimes they lie, saying things are going fine and they haven't even been started. Especially in the case of a new FT, how can they be blamed for anything? It is the school's responsibility even though the FT is held accountable. FTs are unable to get the job done. The PSB/ provincial FAO often refuse to deal with unaccompanied foreigners. The school FAOs themselves don't know the process. How is an FT supposed to know it?

You Sinophiles are ill!

roadwalker · Joined: 24 Aug 2005 Posts: 1750 Location: Ch

Miles Smiles · Joined: 07 Jun 2010 Posts: 1294 Location: Heebee Jeebee

I have to support the statements that some FAO's are plain incompetent and/or lazy or apathetic.

There's not much that you can do about it. Frequent reminders work sometimes. Sometimes, the FT has to suffer the consequences when the FAO actually DOES act on the first few reminders but doesn't acknowledge the reminders until the FAO gets fed up with receiving the "Please tell me the status of..." emails.

Going into the FAO and raising heck does no good because it just plays into the hands of the FAO's beliefs that most westerners have volatile personalities.

At my li'l outpost of progress, there's a rumor circulating that some people who are just a few years out of college attain high positions of responsibility by paying for their jobs. I believe it.

Cyberkada · Joined: 04 Dec 2011 Posts: 306 Location: Xi'an, China

Lets see... One FAO in Suzhou held another teachers documents (passport, et al) for 1.5 months - the teacher was sent to Nanjing I know this as she processed our documents at the same time, and I arrived a month later.

Another one here in Xi'an lost here another FT's FEC. I'm pretty bitchy and forceful about my passport/ other documents. The passport doesn't leave my sight if possible. She did not take our documents to the PSB here to process and a Chinese teacher called the police and we were raided. Seems the high school here we were sent to was illegally using a local university's chop.

In my 20 years of teaching internationally, I have never seen such incompetence. The HR replies to e-mails very slowly if at all...

igorG · Joined: 10 Aug 2010 Posts: 1473 Location: asia

This matter, that the OP has described, may be as much an example of the employer's /FAO's incompetence as an example of the high up authorities' poor follow-up or difficulties to cope with the officialdom and regulations.

The visa issuing PSB, to my knowledge, may not be able to accept a work permit application in which something is missing. Therefore, a temporary one month F visa is suggestable. However illegal to work and accept a salary from school, this visa may provide a short-term solution that is better explainable to the officials than anything else.