Welcome to Bolivia (or the hassle of getting a temporary residence permit)

Planning on staying in Bolivia for a period longer than three months? Welcome to the mega-process that is the Bolivian temporary residence application (residencia temporal). Unfortunately, the days when you could stay in the country for 90 days, then cross the border to Peru or Chile and re-enter 24-48 hours later to start a new 90-day stay are over (especially for U.S. citizens; for others, it is also harder and depends mostly on the mood and whim of the immigration official at the border). If you overstay your visa, you are fined $2 per day. In some cases, the cumulative fine may still turn out to be cheaper than getting the residence permit, which altogether costs somewhere between $400 and $500, depending on who helps you with the paperwork (see below). For us though, given that we will be here for 11 months, the fine is not the cheaper option. Thus, here we are, embarking on the mega-process and keeping our fingers crossed. (As a side note, I have heard that the residence process in Bulgaria is also quite nightmarish, which makes me wonder why the countries that hold the least interest for potential immigrants have the most complex immigration procedures?)



The list of documents you will need for the residence permit (if you have come in on a non-tourist visa, Visa de Objeto Determinado) is longer than any list for any bureaucratic process I have experienced so far (including the U.S. green card and naturalization processes) - as you will see below. Anyone who enters as a tourist and later wishes to change his/her status, needs to go through a mini-process preceding this one.

1. Letter from a lawyer requesting the temporary residence (apparently, this letter also has to state that you are a good person; nice reference from someone who barely knows me).
2. Valid passport.
3. Photocopies of the picture and Bolivian visa pages of your passport.
4. Work contract that has been certified by the Ministry of Labor and photocopy of the tax identification number document of the organization.
5. If you don't have a work contract, then present a notarized letter detailing the purpose of your stay and your source of financial support.
6. If you belong to any societies, present a legalized photocopy of a) the founding documents (registered by the Foundation for Business Development), b) the tax identification number document (executed by the National Revenue Service).
7. If you are married to a Bolivian citizen or have children who are Bolivian citizens, present the original marriage and birth certificates. If you were married overseas, present a legalized and authenticated copy of the marriage certificate and its respective translation, if necessary.
8. Criminal record certificate drawn up by the Special Forces in the Fight Against Crime (for those older than 16 years).
9. Criminal record certificate drawn up by INTERPOL (for those older than 16 years) (really, INTERPOL?).
10. Address registration certificate drawn up by the Special Forces in the Fight Against Crime.
11. Medical certificate showing that the applicant is not suffering from any infectious diseases, executed by the Institute for Occupational Health.
12. One photograph, size 4x4 cms on red background (red background?!?)


Note: Additional documents are needed to complete a number of these steps. It's simply a bureaucratic maze - a process within a process, that is almost impossible to decipher. So far, we have gathered (or so we think) all the necessary paperwork to be able to do each of these steps. We also completed Step #11, the medical exam, which was pretty thorough and even included a dental check (?!?!). Hopefully, the results will be to the Bolivian authorities' liking. Tomorrow, we are headed to INTERPOL where we will be fingerprinted and asked all sorts of questions about our past (oooooh). Needless to say, it is nearly impossible to do this without the help of a local who is familiar with the process. The so-called tramitadores are there to guide you and prevent you from getting ripped off, for a fee of course, but it is well worth paying. Their full-time job may be something completely unrelated - ours works for a tourist agency. But, by having gone through the process so many times, they know most of the people behind the counters of the various agencies and can help speed things along. Or so we've heard (and hope!). So, fingers crossed that things go smoothly and we can soon travel in and out of the country without problems, should we want to. As a friend said, "You will have to sacrifice the necessary red tape at midnight." I believe it is about that time.