Korean Job Discussion Forums

[TML1976]

My son was born on Feb. 14 and the hospital told me that I had to get a passport for him and then register him with immigration. So I finally got the passport last week and today I was getting all the other paper work ready to go to the office in Suwon on thursday. So I called them to find out what I needed and in the middle of the conversation the guy asked me when my son was born and I told him Feb 14 and he told me that I had to pay a late fee because I only had 30 days to register the baby after his birth.

I was very surprised because they told me that I had to have the passport ready before registering and that process takes at least 3 weeks. So i told the guy about that and he told me that I didn't actually need the passport and that the receipt given to me by the embassy was enough.

Anyway, the reason I'm posting this is to ask you guys if you know how much the penalty is. I asked the guy but he said he didn't know but he thinks about 10k won.

So does anyone know how much it is?

[ChuckECheese]

I'm not really sure but it would depend on the immi officer on the day of your visit.

If the guy is kewl, he would let you slide and just tell you congrats.

If the guy is an ass-hole, he would probably charge you 100,000 fine.

Good luck.

[TML1976]

Let's hope I get nice person then.

[Cheonmunka]

So, let's see whether they hired another f%$, or someone nice, decent perhaps.

[SuperHero]

go in, apologize and be polite. Let the officer know that you were misinformed and did not intentially register the baby late.

[ttompatz]

[TML1976]

I'm Canadian and my wife is American. I'm just curious how much the penalty is. I mean if its only 10-20,000 won I don't really care, what scares me is a 100,000+ fine.

[polonius]

Thanks for the info on how much time you have to apply. I recently found out that my wife is pregnant and will have to go through the same process as you.

[ttompatz]

[DHC]

FYI , even if your child is a dual national , if you obtain a foreign passport for the child then the child must be registered with Immigration within 30 days of birth. Your child's foreign passport will be stamped with a notice saying that the holder is a Korean national and must exit/enter Korea on a foreign passport.

Our daughter has had two passports since a week after her birth. In Korea she is treated as a Korean citizen.

[Rikus]

I had the same thing happen as the OP and I had to pay a 100k fine. This was at omokyo.

[TML1976]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

Rikus:

How late did you register your child?

[cosmo]

00

[Rikus]

It was a little over a month. My child is part Korean and part American. i chose to register him as an American only, because he was a boy. I didn't want to have any difficulties later with the military. If he had been a girl I probably would have went dual because the Korean government is trying to raise the birth rate and will pay for most of the cost of having a child and pay most of the day care fee.

[TML1976]

K, so I went to immi today and got the registration done. The guy was very nice and he told me that because I was late 20 days I would have to pay 100,000 won, but since it was only 20 days and I explained to him how difficult it is to travel for 1.5 hours to seoul to get to the Canadian embassy when your child in only 1,2,3, or 4 weeks old, he said he understood but there was nothing he could do about the penalty, but there was something he could do about the registration fees. Luckily I had not paid for anything yet.

As a result, I ended up saving the registration fee for my kid and the fee for changing my wife's visa from an E2 to F3.

Anyway, this post was to give you guys an update but more importantly to thank everyone for their input.