Job Discussion Forums

[fchris171]

Hi,

Me and my gf have spent a significant amount of time looking for this info everywhere on the web in English and Chinese yet we can't find anything that's states an actual time.

Does anyone know how long before its expiry date a foreign expert certificate can be extended?

I've found plenty of stuff saying the visa or residency permit can be renewed 30 days before but there is nothing that relates to the FEC.

My school uses an agency who seem a bit shady to do all this stuff so I don't really trust what they say. Once they told me 30 days and then when i questioned this they told me 60. I'm planning a trip back home so i have to plan this in.

Surely it can't be 30 days as that is one hell of a rush to get that done as well as a visa renewal.

(this will be done in Beijing btw)

[tlkdmc]

First of all, your post SUBJECT is useless, per the rules, subjects are supposed to contain actual useful details about the point of the thread.

A resident permit and foreign expert certificate must be submitted for renewal no less than one day prior to the expiration. As often happens with the resident permit, people go to renew it the day before it expires. So long as it's submitted prior to expiration, you're set.

The issue arises in that you must have a valid foreign expert certificate in-hand to even submit a resident permit.

Thus, the common sense math is that since it takes on average 7 days to get a foreign expert certificate (really, at most), then you must renew it 7 days + the time you have before resident permit expiration and so on.

The math is there, just to do it.

[Son of Bud Powell]

fchris171:

Are you in China? If so, ask your FAO or your boss. This is critical information. You need to be sure that you get answers from the right end of the horse.

[fchris171]

First of all, apologies for the subject, rookie error and i can see that it says that on a sticky, i've just changed it.

There's one thing with regards to the FEC that you said there which I know is actually wrong (well at least it is for Beijing). Still, thanks for the reply though.

When submitting any application, renewal or simply a request for a change of information (e.g address change) an on-line application must be made first, you're then given an appointment around a week later in which time they do a preliminary assessment. 7 to 10 days after that appointment you get you FEC back.

Myself and my school have had to do one of those on 3 separate occasions over the past year and its always been the same process.

I know that adding all that to the 15 working day turn around for the visa renewal is simple maths but without knowing a definite start date for the FEC i'm looking at a finish date which has a 2 to 3 week difference. For me that's the difference between making a family members birthday or not.

Yeh, i'm in China, hopefully i'll eventually get time to actually go down to the SAFEA but its a bit far. As i said the school uses an agent to do all this so they advised me to ask them. That's when i got the 2 different answers and decided to find out myself to be 100% sure.

[fchris171]

coming back to answer my own question here in case anyone else needs this info.

I made the long trek to the Beijing SAFEA and was informed that a foreign expert certificate can be renewed up to 2 months before the expiry date.

It would then take the usual turn around time that I mentioned in my previous post, thus allowing you to renew your residence permit as soon as your within the 30 days of its expiry.

Not sure if this applies to other provinces though.