Caroline von der Groeben asked 3 years ago
Hi, I have a M visa and am in Shanghai right now. As the situation is not getting better in Europe at the moment I would like to extend my Visa. First question is how long ncan I extend it? 60 or 90 days? How often can I extend it? And how does it work? Unfortunately I did not find an answer in the Q&A section to my questions. Thank you very much for your help. Caroline
smooth-administrator Staff answered 3 years ago
Hi Caroline,
I’ve heard people with M-visas are only granted extensions once due to covid. (During pre-covid times, they’ve basically stopped providing extensions on M-visas altogether.) Nationalities, availabilities of flights, covid situation in home country all play a factor in their(immigration officers’) decision-making process.
And you would get the extension by the same number of days you received for your M-visa. So if you are on a 30-day M visa, you get a 30 day extension. If you have are on a 60-day M visa, then you get a 60-day extension.
You would need to ask whichever company invited you to China to prepare a document in Chinese that confirms your situation(unsafe covid situation back in Europe), what you will be doing during extension (i.e. more work with the local entity), and, most importantly, confirming you won’t be causing any trouble, your accommodation and expenses all won’t be a problem for the extended stay. The China-registered company would need to use their red stamp/chop to stamp the document.
Basically, they want to tie a foreigner to a China-based entity or a Chinese person with a local ID to act as a guarantor. So that in case a foreigner causes a problem or runs out of money, the guarantor will get involved.
So in case you cannot get that company that invited you to China to prepare a document, you get a Chinese friend with a Chinese ID(so cannot be an American-born Chinese friend) to write a statement, with their Chinese ID number included.
Good luck, Caorline.