When foreign workers enter Vietnam to live and work, they will face many difficulties such as language barriers, no native relationships leading to difficulties in life, and difficulty in being hired as domestic workers in common jobs, etc. However, the first difficulty they face will be about getting a work permit to be able to work in Vietnam. In this article, ASL LAW Firm will point out the common difficulties that foreign workers face when applying for a work permit in Vietnam.
When applying for, re-granting, and extending work permits in Vietnam, foreign workers will have to go through many difficult and complicated stages.
The time to apply for a work permit and consular legalization of documents is relatively long
According to the law, enterprises can only use foreign workers to work in Vietnam for managerial, executive, expert, and technical positions that Vietnamese workers have not yet been able to do according to production and business needs.
Thereby, to be able to prove that the enterprise really needs to recruit foreign workers for the above positions, the enterprise must apply for approval of the need to use foreign workers, which usually takes about 10 working days (Article 4 of Decree 152/2020/ND-CP).
In addition, enterprises must also carry out the procedure for applying for judicial records under Clause 1, Article 48 of the 2009 Law on Judicial Records, which takes 10 days and lasts up to 15 days in case verification is required.
Finally, the time to apply for a work permit will take about 5 working days (clause 2, Article 11 of Decree 152/2020/ND-CP).
The total time to complete the dossier as well as apply for a work permit according to regulations will range from 25 – 30 days. However, this is just a theoretical timeframe. Practically applicable, because the case of each foreign worker as well as the recruiting enterprise and state agency is different, this time may be doubled.
In addition, in order for the relevant records and documents to be certified, foreign workers and foreign employers must also consularly legalize necessary documents according to Clause 10, Article 9 of Decree 123/2020/ND-CP.
Although it usually only takes 1 working day, because the consular legalization procedure has not been popularized, the processing time may be extended several times.
Prepare all kinds of documents in many different types of dossiers
The application for, re-granting, and extension of a work permit requires different documents to be prepared.
Thereby, in order to properly prepare all kinds of documents, foreign workers need to carefully study labor law as well as additional decrees and circulars on work permits for foreign workers.
According to Article 9 of Decree No. 152/2020 of the Government, the application file for a work permit for foreigners includes 08 different types of documents. Thereby, in order to fully and properly prepare the necessary documents, foreign workers should contact a reputable law firm on Vietnamese and international Labor Law and have already obtained lots of experience in handling legal work permit issues to receive timely assistance.
After fully preparing documents, the employer reports to the Ministry of Labor, Invalids, and Social Affairs/People’s Committee of the province where the foreign worker is expected to work.
The validity period of the work permit limited the work efficiency of the foreign workers
According to Article 155 of the Labor Code 2019, from 2021 onwards, the maximum validity period of work permits for foreign workers in Vietnam is 2 years.
Each work permit can only be renewed once.
Thereby, due to the short validity period, the work of foreign workers in Vietnam is subject to many restrictions.
Usually, due to strict conditions on recruiting foreign workers, once recruited, foreign workers often intend to work for many consecutive years at an enterprise with preferential policies that parties agree.
However, because of the short validity period, the working relationship between the foreign worker and the employer has suffered many shortcomings.
ASL LAW is the top-tier Vietnam law firm for Employment and Labor Law. If you need any advice, please contact us for further information or collaboration.
***Other service of ASL LAW – full service Vietnam law firm *** |
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Oversea investment consultancy for Vietnamese enterprises |
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