Residence permits – Submitting documents & changing personal information: What you need to pay attention to!

What you should be careful of when submitting documents to the Immigration Services

or when you change your personal data.

Very often there is not enough information about the responsibilities and the prohibitions that a third country’s resident has concerning the documents that they submit to the Decentralized Administration Services (Immigration Services). As a result, there are serious consequences that may lead even to the loss of the legal status of residence in the country. Below you will find collected most important responsibilities that you have during the providing or the renewal of your residence permit or when changes at your personal data take place.

Initial providing or renewal of the residence permit

• You can submit in order to be provided for the first time or renew a residence permit ONLY IF you have the necessary documents. If you do not have the prerequisites for this particular residence permit and the documents that you have submitted do not have any relation with the application or they are not real (falsified, forged) then your application will be rejected from the Service. For this reason, you do not let any “professional” to submit instead of you, even if they promise you that there is not going to be any problem, in case that you know that you do not fulfill all the criteria to take the residence permit.

• Proof of home address that are accepted by the Immigration Services:

1) In case you rent a house: you print the online document that appears at the rent data on taxisnet which contains your acceptance and must have your name as the tenant.
2) In case you have bought a house: either the house purchase contract or the E9 from taxisnet that shows that the house belongs to you.
3) If you are a guest and you do not have anything from the above:
i) Either the tenant of the house should add your name and surname as a person they host at the “Notes” of the document of taxisnet (in this case Solemn Declarations for accommodation validated from the Service Center for Citizens (KEP) are not accepted). 
ii)Or the owner of the house (not the tenant) that hosts you and owns the house should make a Solemn Declaration of accommodation at the Service Center for Citizens (KEP) and with their E9 or the house purchase contract and you should submit those documents all together as a proof of your residence.

• When you submit an online application for an initial issuance or a renewal of your residence permit, the communication with the Service takes place only via email and particularly the email address that you have stated at your online application. So, it is important to check your email often, because there you will be informed about any additional documents that they may ask for or about the appointment date for the biometric data (fingerprints). All the notifications, apart from the email, can be also found online on the third country national application status.

Change of your data and notification to the Immigration Service.

• When you change home address or marital status (contract of marriage/civil partnership, divorce, termination of the civil partnership, birth of a child etc) you must declare it immediately to the Immigration Service that issues or has issued your residence permit within 2 months, otherwise there is a 100 euro fine. The fact that you have declared your change of data to the tax office does not mean that the Immigration Service is automatically informed, for this reason you should declare it to the Immigration Service separately. The declaration is being done via mail (by registered mail) to the Immigration Service in which you will include an application with your issue and your data and the necessary documentation.

• When you change your passport either because of loss or because of renewal, you should declare it to the Immigration Service immediately. The declaration is being done via mail (with registered mail) to the Immigration Service, in which you include an application with your data and the change of the passport as well as a validated copy of all the pages of the new passport.

• In case your residence permit is lost or stolen you should declare it immediately to the Police Department of your area and then, with the certificate of loss that you will take for the police, you must submit an application to the Immigration Service for the reissue of your residence permit.