# work permit / permanent residence confusion



## tapsmatenga (Apr 8, 2014)

Hi All

On Thursday 22 May 2014 i applied for a General work permit at the Johannesburg Home Affairs. To the shock of my life, on Friday morning (23 May ) i received an sms from Home Affairs i received an sms from Home Affairs to collect outcome of my Permanent residence (Relative category ) that i had applied in December 2013. Initially i had been told PR takes more than 2 years so i was shocked. 
My question now is what are they going to do with the work permit application i submitted? Does it automatically falls away or they might accidentally cancel my permanent residence. I am expecting to collect Permanent Residence in 5 days time.

And i wanna know the normal wait from the sms day to the day it arrives to the office of application, as i have heard that it may be a while. 

Any help is much appreciated

Kind Regards


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## Skilled (May 10, 2011)

Congrats on getting your PR. You should be a relieved individual, I am sure. Whilst on that apply for your ID as soon as you collect the certificate. Apparently, it takes time to be issued as well.

Your Work Permit application falls away in theory. Even if they approve it they wont give it to you because once your collect your PR certificate your passport will be linked to it. They will notice that you have a PR.

The situation is normal. You always need to be on a valid VISA even if you have a PR application pending. So you actually did the right thing to apply for your work visa. They will cancel it once they realise you have PR. Actually, they wont give it to you unless you do one of the stupid things one can do that is to cancel your PR status On collecting your PR, just tell them you had a pending VISA application and you want to cancel it (Do it after collecting your PR certificate and you have verified that everything is spelled correctly on the certificate).

Otherwise, happy for you. No more VISA hassles and all these nonsense stuff.

Mine took exactly 5 days after receiving an SMS of finalisation.

One more thing, while filling out your ID application form, take note of the barcode number somewhere on the middle of the page with your fingerprints. That number will be your reference number. U normally should get it through SMS after they capture your application but sometimes it does come until they finalise your application. In the meantime you wont be able to trace it. Just write it down for future reference.


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## tapsmatenga (Apr 8, 2014)

thank you so much skilled. fingers crossed, i hope its a successful outcome. I will do exactly that.
Thank you for the ID information. 
As long as i get my ID within 3 years of the current work contract i got. i do not wanna struggle get a Job after my 3 year contract lapse. 

Kind Regards


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## LegalMan (Dec 26, 2012)

Correct, your Work Permit application falls away automatically.


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## tapsmatenga (Apr 8, 2014)

Skilled said:


> Congrats on getting your PR. You should be a relieved individual, I am sure. Whilst on that apply for your ID as soon as you collect the certificate. Apparently, it takes time to be issued as well.
> 
> Your Work Permit application falls away in theory. Even if they approve it they wont give it to you because once your collect your PR certificate your passport will be linked to it. They will notice that you have a PR.
> 
> ...


Hi skilled

what is the procedure of applying for an SA ID? I hear that the PR has to be verified first and then i can apply for an ID. so how do i get the PR verification and what is the fees?

I want to do this on wednesday at the Randburg home affairs. 
your help will be much appreciated. 
Kind regards


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## tapsmatenga (Apr 8, 2014)

HI skilled and and Mr Legal man 

I just received an sms from Home Affairs with the reference number for the work permit application that i made before i knew about the outcome of the permanent residence. so now im stressed that it might cause a bit of confusion with Home Affairs ( scared they might cancel my perm res ). Any advice on what should i do?
Should i leave it like that or should go to the office i applied and tell them. 
Whats the procedure of cancelling an application.
Hope it wont affect my permanent residence.
I would appreciate your help. 

Kind Regards


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## LegalMan (Dec 26, 2012)

Do nothing, all is fine like that.

How long do you have on your current Work Visa?


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## tapsmatenga (Apr 8, 2014)

Hi Mr Legal man

What happened is i applied for permanent residence and temporary relative permit in December 2013. I got the Temporary Relative permit in february. I then got a job in March and i was told i cant work with a temporary relative permit ( biological son of a permanent resident ) i have to change to a work visa. I then applied for a change of existing conditions from a Temporary relative visa to a general work permit on 22 May. The next day 23 May i got an sms that my permanent residence was finalized and i got the certificate last week. Due to over excitement i forgot to tell them about the work permit application i had done. 
So today i received an sms giving me the reference number of the work permit application and im now worried.


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## MissGlobal (Aug 4, 2012)

Make sure you get a police notarized copy of your certificate before you use it to apply for your ID - Home Affairs has been known to lose them.... and you don't want to be without any documentation.


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## Skilled (May 10, 2011)

There is absolutely nothing to worry about.

If you are not convinced, call the HA Call center and ask.

Home affairs requires you to stay on a valid VISA today even if your PR is getting finalised tomorrow. In other words foreign nationals in SA are required renew their expiring visas even if they have pending PR applications.


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## cjaphet (Jun 24, 2014)

tapsmatenga said:


> Hi All
> 
> On Thursday 22 May 2014 i applied for a General work permit at the Johannesburg Home Affairs. To the shock of my life, on Friday morning (23 May ) i received an sms from Home Affairs i received an sms from Home Affairs to collect outcome of my Permanent residence (Relative category ) that i had applied in December 2013. Initially i had been told PR takes more than 2 years so i was shocked.
> My question now is what are they going to do with the work permit application i submitted? Does it automatically falls away or they might accidentally cancel my permanent residence. I am expecting to collect Permanent Residence in 5 days time.
> ...


Hi 
I can't really answer your question instead I hav a question. I wanted to know if you applied under the new laws or the old ones? If you applied with the new ones, how long did it take the department of labour to issue your certificate?

Thank you


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## tapsmatenga (Apr 8, 2014)

hi there
i applied under the old rules.


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## Jujube (Sep 12, 2011)

Hi all,
just got to DHA Wynberg office early this morning & they refused to process my ID application until I got my PR certificate verified. I knew that was a pre-requirement but I didn't know that you couldn't apply at the same time & avoid coming back/queuing again.

As for the verification, they literally just fax a copy of the certificate & then wait - no ways to track progress or follow up...and obviously they do not want to give an indication of timeline.


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## The Struggle (May 4, 2015)

*Job search woes for a permanent resident*

Fellow permanent residents. I got mine in 2009. I studied and got my degrees. Job hunting is a non event. All I hear is talk of BEE and that one has to be a citizen.

The issue is not that there aren't any jobs in my field. There are there- for citizens that is(by birth and naturalized before 1994).

I have since applied for citizenship. Not sure how long that will take. Even then with EE, I suspect getting a job will still be very tough since I would've naturalized way after 1994.

I am interested to know if other permanent residents are experiencing this. it seems as if it's time to emigrate again.


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