convert L to F in China?

[新墨西哥人]

We are about to go to China, and are waiting on our visas (last minute stress, fun fun). My husband was supposed to get an F visa as he will be a visiting scientist at Chinese Academy of Science in Shanghai. But because of the Chinese New Year, things got messed up - the consulate wanted some documents but his contacts in China were all on vacation until last Friday.

 

Now we are too short on time so we changed his application to be for a tourist visa. But he should have an F visa. I'm not sure he can be legally paid by them while on the L visa. He does not need a work permit, btw. It's all complicated, I think the CAS hasn't really handled many of these since the various rule changes because they didn't seem to know exactly what he needed. 

 

We're thinking of trying to get the correct visa either in Japan (we are going to Japan for a week before we go to Shanghai), or go to HKG. But I just read the HKG thread and I don't feel super optimistic about it. I also read that maybe he could convert his visa in China from L to F. 

 

My daughter & I will be on tourist visas, and we'll have to leave every 60 days. Another concern is that his F visa have multiple entries so he can accompany us. I saw that many visas issued in HKG for non HK citizens are single or dual entry. I don't mind travelling alone with her, but I worry about whether I will be questioned why we're traveling without her daddy. 

 

I've emailed CTS HK to ask them what they think. We asked our contact in China to email the Chinese consulate in Sapporo, and I think we'll get them to ask around about converting within China as well. 

anyway I appreciate your thoughts on the matter! 谢谢

[jbradfor]

 

I don't mind travelling alone with her, but I worry about whether I will be questioned why we're traveling without her daddy.

I cannot answer the visa questions, but if you are concerned about traveling alone there are standard forms you can fill out and get notarized authorizing one parent to travel with minor children.  Mexico, for example, requires this, but it's not a bad idea for other countries as well.  Bring that, and your marriage and birth certificates. 

 

AFAIK there is no official State Department version, but a quick web search finds many, e.g. http://photos.state.gov/libraries/unitedkingdom/164203/cons-acs/sample_letter_of_consent_to_travel.pdf

[新墨西哥人]

My husband and I were talking about getting a notarized letter today to handle that, thanks for the web search link.

 

We may have bigger issues though. Our visa service (who I'm never using again by the way - they never call us when there is a problem - we just find out the problems when we call them) said the consulate didn't release our passports to them because they want a letter from the institute so my husband can get a travel visa. We're leaving Friday morning! Now maybe we'll get them on Thursday. ARG. We sent these in almost a month ago. I should have made my husband buy tickets farther out like my gut told me to.

 

Anyway we told the visa service to get our passports no matter what today so we can at least go on our Japan part of our trip. The change fees alone are probably going to be more than just flying roundtrip back to the U.S. from Tokyo to get visas if we can't get them in HK. :-( And we'll most likely miss our ski vacation in Japan although my stepson will be able to go as he has his passport and was only doing the Japan part of our trip. He probably will like being totally on his own (he's an adult - or maybe I should say adultolescent).

 

sigh...

[新墨西哥人]

an update: it turns out the Chinese consulate had put tourist visas in our passports (after we said it was OK to convert our application to a tourist visa), and were waiting on a new tourist visa application forms for all of us. It seems a bit backwards, to put the visa in before you have the application, but it explains why they wouldn't release our passports to the visa service when we asked them to retrieve them, visa or no visa!

[新墨西哥人]

I now am the proud owner of an L Visa. I have a question about it. It is multiple entry, valid for 10 years, and it has a 60 day duration of stay. Does that mean as long as I leave the country every 60 days I can stay as long as I want?

[jbradfor]

Valid for 10 years?  Wow, that's a new one to me, I must be behind the times.  If so, yes, I believe that is the case.

 

Glad it all worked out for you.

[889]

"I now am the proud owner of an L Visa. I have a question about it. It is multiple entry, valid for 10 years, and it has a 60 day duration of stay. Does that mean as long as I leave the country every 60 days I can stay as long as I want?"

 

To date, China's been pretty relaxed about this and foreigners, at least from Western countries, haven't encountered much problem essentially living in China with visa trips as necessary. But every once in a while, China decides to crack down on something, so there's always the risk that at some point China will restrict frequent border crossers. A visa itself, whether from China or elsewhere, never guaranties entry.

 

(As to ten-year 60-day visas, they are issued routinely to most Americans these days under a  reciprocal policy that began last November, discussed in another thread here.)

[新墨西哥人]

I plan on staying less than 180 days, so I would think 2-3 re-entries should be OK. I could also apply for whatever visa one can get when accompany a spouse on a work visa. But would be nice to not have to bother. I've been wondering, if my husband gets a Z does that invalidate his tourist visa? Or can he has that tourist visa if we go for vacation say in a few years? 

[889]

I can’t easily look it up now, but somewhere on some official page it does say China permits two valid visas at the same time if they are different types. Not all countries permit this.

Search and you’ll probably find it. But to prepare yourself for your coming China experience, do it without Google.