Over the course of my career, I helped people from various countries with their visa matters; Columbia, Mexico, South Africa and many others. I dare to say that one of the most difficult countries to immigrate from is surely the Philippines.
Getting a term at the Embassy
The first issue occurs when trying to schedule a term at the Czech Embassy in Manila. Unlike other countries, this Czech Embassy is limited by quotas due to high numbers of applicants, and cannot simply give out terms to everyone interested. Instead, a lottery was implemented.
Within this lottery, one must purchase a lottery ticket (ticket purchasing happens once every 3 months) and then hope for a good luck to be drawn as one of the 25 winners, as only those get a term to submit their applications in the next 3 upcoming months. As you can see, this can make things a bit complicated.
In case of not being drawn, one may pay attention to the fact that some of the documents as application attachments have only 180 days validity. It may therefore be needed to re-collect some documents, arrange their Apostille and translation again.
The lottery can be avoided by getting the company to one of the Governmental programs.
PDOS, OEC and POEA
Managed to win the lottery and the Employee card application approved? That is unfortunately not yet a reason to celebrate as Filipinos are required to get a departure-approval stamp, also called Overseas Employment certificate (OEC), without which one cannot leave the Philippines for work. The reason for this is to educate Filipinos about their rights when it comes to foreign labour and work standards. The authority watching over these processes is POEA - Philippine Overseas Employment Administration.
Here the process differs for hires through agencies (big volume of low-skilled workforce) or one time direct-hire of specialized worker (40 000+ CZK salary).
At first, one must get their Employment contract verified by POLO (Philippines overseas Labour Office). - In case of direct-hire, it is a matter of submitting a few documents and sworn statements that are collected by the Czech company. In case of job agencies or low skilled workers, it gets more complicated, and it is required to hire a job agency in the Philippines to ask for help. List of authorized agencies can be found here or at the Czech Embassy website. The Czech Employer also needs to get certified.
Once contract verified, it must be shipped to the Philippines.
Once contract received, the worker must register at the POEA website and fill in all the personal details. Afterwards, Phase 1 documents must be uploaded (entry visa, employment contract) - it will take 3-4 working days for the request to be evaluated. (Step by step guide can be found here or here.)
During Phase 2 the system will ask for more documents.
valid medical certificate from DOH
pre-employment orientation seminar certificate (can be done online)
the seminar takes 6 hours and 7 topics are covered
pre-departure orientation seminar certificate issued by OWWA (can eb done online)
POEA clearance
health insurance coverage in the Philipines
Once all submitted, wait for the status to change from evaluation to approved - it will take approximately 3-15 days.
5. Once approved, one must visit the POEA office to collect the Overseas worker certificate where originals of all the documents must be presented and a fee of 7470 PHP must be paid.
Note that most of the agencies and authorities involved in the above described process will be charging fees, which may make this particular immigration more pricey than others too.
Hiring a skilled Filipino directly and unsure how to proceed with the contract verification? Do not hesitate to contact me!
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