Happy to hear you got your situation sorted without having to shell out any extra cash!

I wanted to get the multiple reentry permit just to be sure I could enter and exit the country freely whenever international travel becomes a possibility again. I'm hoping that happens within the next 18 months, though I guess you never know 😓

@Bérénice ******

happy to share in case it helps anyone else!

As an added note, my old extension of stay was good for 24 months and my new one is good for 18 months - though given the circumstances I am certainly not complaining!

Yes and no 🙄

My understanding is that according to immigration I was under amnesty. However, the Board of Investments was initially not aware that the amnesty policy applied to people on non-B visas as well as tourist visas. As a result, they deleted my work permit from their system as soon as it expired.

Because of this, instead of simply renewing my extension of stay as I would have been able to if I had done so before it expired - which I technically should have been able to do according to the amnesty policy - my employer essentially had to apply for a brand new work permit and then extension of stay as though I had just entered the country and started working again.

The BoI did not accept my new work permit application until I had received a temporary extension of stay stamp from immigration through September 26th - which they confusingly kept referring to as a "COVID Visa".

So to summarize I had to:

-Get a temporary extension of stay stamp through September 26th from immigration

-Apply for a new work permit

-Use the work permit to apply for a new extension of stay and reentry permit

Business, I am a Software Engineer

@Nick ******

we'll see in about a week...

So here's an update on my situation in case it's useful to anyone else:

Returned to immigration this morning. It seems that the issue is that the Board of Investment, which handles work permitting, is under the impression that the amnesty policy applies only to people on tourist visas. I had to very firmly argue my case that the amnesty grace period applies to visa holders of all types.

They eventually conceded that this was the case. However, since they were not previously aware of this, they apparently already removed my previous work permit from the system. I was told it will take them a week to prepare a new work permit for me after which I will then be able to extend my extension of stay and purchase a new re-entry permit as though it had not expired.

No luck today. My company's representative aparantly didn't bring the necessary documents. Guess I'm trying again tomorrow

@Stuart ********

I said I'm buying you "a beer" you can all figure out how to divy the bottle up 😅