Dear all,

I thank you very much for all the informations shared by you so far, which helped me a lot in many ways. After 3 months of my hard work in my first job my company is willing to give me an unlimited work contract.

I came to Germany in the month of Jan(2008) on a family reunion visa. Since I have not completed my 2 yrs I don’t have ‘Erwerbstätigkeit gestattet’ but a special clause saying I am allowed to work for “ my company name” from nov2008 to april2009 and my residence permit is till may2009 based on my husbands visa status.

When I called the visa office they said I will get a 3 yrs or unlimited work permit to work for my current company, but my visa status will still be family visa upto 5 yrs. So my residence permit will depend completely on my husband. My husband is completing his PhD soon.

My Questions:
With my new unlimited work contract can I change my family visa to a work visa directly from Germany? Do I need to go to India for this? Do any of you have experience in this regards pls share. In what ways can my company help me in this regard?

Please share your views.

Padmaja

With my new unlimited work contract can I change my family visa to a work visa directly from Germany? Do I need to go to India for this?

Yes, you can change it in germany itself and travel to india is not necessary. But i sincerely hope they dont ask you to go through the arbeitsmarkt prüfung in the present situation.

Thank you Raj for the reply.

Is there any link which contains such information?
The link may help because, over the phone I was informed I cannot change even if I have a unlimited work contract.

Could my company help me in anyways?(which makes the process smoother)


Padmaja

Hi Paddy,

please read again what Raj was telling you.

I found very clever his opinion.

Even if you get an unlimited work contract, you will have a "Probezeit" of six months. Better don´t cause problems to the new company in this time and free them to your visa issues.

You have now a visa, you didn´t have to "suffer" the process of Arbeitsmarktcheck. Think now with this economic crisis comming, maybe won´t be that easy to demonstrate there is no german available for your position.

Is not that bad to be depending on your husband´s visa. The best thing is always to secure your job and then, if there is any kind of problem, with your hisband´s visa or even with your husband with a secured job you can change your visa in two seconds, but the contrary case (no job but visa) would be more problematic.

My advice: forget your visa, concentrate in your contract and once you have an unlimited contract and no more Probezeit let´s see again in the forum for new ideas.

Only my two cents!

Thank you YO. These views are really helpful.

Padmaja