How to issue ARC in South Korea

If you plan to live in South Korea more than 91 days its mandatory to have ARC(Alien Registration Card) to avoid getting fined.

My strong recommendation is arrive 10 minutes before you appointment date time because in the immigration office ranch you need to fill a form plus have a black ink open, the immigration office branch have pens but sometimes they are busy so prepare it in advance.

The documents can vary per one school to another but I heard that these are the common ones:

In order to extend or issue the ARC(ARC: Alien Registration Card) students must submit the following to the immigration office 

Visa Extension request form: you can get it in immigration office or print it in the website Hi Korea in  advance.

Tip: take a small glue stick because sometimes the glue stick that immigration office has is busy or arrive early to make the process smoothly and fast. 

How to book an appointment 

This link will redirect you to the Reserve visit option in the HI KOREA website:

1.give a click where says “Visit Reservation Application (non- member)”

2. Then since its the first time to issue the alien card registration you must make the identity verification using passport

3. To book the appointment select the office of your jurisdiction, check the ‘Location’ table below to see which jurisdiction belongs to you.

Locations

In my case the place of my residence is Gwanak-gu so I have to go to Seoul Immigration Office.

(서울출입국·외국인청) after selecting the jurisdiction mention which process you want to do in this case is the alien card issuance and mention your phone number and the 4 digit password to check the reservation status in the future and mention the date of visit and time, the process doesn’t take more than 10 minutes, then apply and submit the application.  

As soon as the reservation is completed prepare all the documents and don’t forget arriving the immigration office 10 minutes in advance, only people that have made a reservation online are authorized to make the process, due to the corona virus before arriving I passed through the fever checking points the before getting inside the immigration office hall they made me call one number and basically they said its in purpose to have the register of the people’s phone number in order to prevent cluster infections if any, then I had to sanitize my hands with antibacterial gel plus they checked the fever through the camera and since everything was fine after I showed all my papers

I got the certificate of application for permit go stay the issuance of the alien card takes 1.5 month and can be any delays due to the corona 19, in order to pick up the (ARC) I have to take the paper and my passport to get the (ARC) with the actual period of sojourn plus my actual residence.

Thank you so much for reading my experience and I hope it can help the foreigners that are coming to Korea and issuing the (ARC) for the first time.

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