INFO: China Police Certificate for Foreigners

[heathius 0]

Some new regulations went into effect earlier this year that will come into play if you are a foreigner trying to obtain a Chinese police certificate. Chinese people can still obtain full police certificates with no change (as far as we know).

The following restrictions have gone into effect for foreigners:

1.) Police certificates can only be obtained for time periods in which you are in China on a Z or X visa (work or student). You cannot obtain police certificates for the time that you were in China on L or F visas (tourist or extended stay).

2.) You must submit a letter from your employer/school that corresponds to the Z or X visa in your passport. The letter will be submitted to the PSB when you apply for the police cert. The letter should be in Chinese and it should state the specifics of your work/study. It should also contain a statement declaring that you have committed no crimes while working/studying there. The PSB can provide a template for this letter.

3.) The police cert that you receive will only cover the time period for the particular Z or X visa that you submitted a letter for. If you have held several jobs or studied at several schools while in China, you will have to try to obtain mutiple police certs, one for each of the Z or X visas that you have had. (We are lucky because my fiancee has only worked for one company. I'm not sure how helpful the PSB will be if you try to apply for multiple police certs.)

We have not yet been able to verify what affect this will have on our K-1 process, since the K-1 instructions clearly state that police certs should cover the entire length of stay in the country. Since we entered initially on L visas and then had F visas for a while, we cannot obtain a police cert for that time period.

After arguing with the PSB, they finally gave us a statement that proves the above information to be true, which we can submit to the Guangzhou consulate as proof that it is indeed unobtainable. But, they have refused to chop this statement to make it official, so we're not sure if the consulate will accept it.

Not sure if the consulate knows any of this info. Anybody else have a similar experience?

Edited November 7, 2006 by heathius

[aussiewench 9]

Can you post the link to the above information please

[heathius 0]

There is no link. We got this information by trying to obtain a police cert at the Beijing PSB office. I doubt that this information will be posted anytime soon.

Edited November 7, 2006 by heathius

[heathius 0]

Also, you should pray that your chinese employer/school does not skirt tax laws (as dodging taxes is common practice in China). If they do, you may find it very difficult to get the employer/school letter needed for the police cert request. The employer/school will be very reluctant to provide any letter for fear of getting in trouble with the police.

Ah, the joys of living in China!