Posts Tagged ‘zameldowanie’

5 year registration – karta pobytu

Tuesday, March 11th, 2008

I already blogged about my experiences with registering locally, well after growing tired of traipsing to the local council every 3 months I decided to bite the bullet and get my karta pobytu (card of stay). This allows me to register for a 5 year period.

It’s worth mentioning that apparently you can register permanently, but I haven’t looked into this too much and you need the card of stay first anyway. Quoting from the “instruction to the nationals of the European Union member states and their family members” leaflet that they gave me when I applied for my karta pobytu, it says “the Union citizen shall obtain right of permanent residence after five years of continuous residence within the territory of Republic of Poland”.

Also note that you can only get the karta pobytu having already been here for 3 months having already done the local registration as above.

The first problem in doing this is the difficulty in finding out exactly what you are supposed to do, what documents you need and where to go.

There’s a thread here about it on Polish forums where I asked if anyone had tried doing this in Krakow. Just to be sure though I called up the office in Kraków myself to check. They referred me to their portal at www.wrotamalopolski.pl where the forms and instructions are available for download. It took a bit of hunting down but here is the page for registration in małopolskie. Unfortunately the link entitled “wniosek do pobrania (ob. UE)” which in English is “form for download (EU citizens)” is the wrong form. That form is for a replacement card, not a new application. I had to do my application a second time and of course go and get photocopies there and then because of this.

If anyone has links for the right form or for other regions please post a comment.

Where to go

Oddzial do Spraw Cudzoziemców Wydziału Spraw Obywatelskich i Cudzoziemców Małopolskiego Urzędu Wojewódzkiego w Krakowie, ul. św. Sebastiana 9-11, I piętro, pokój 102

Here it is on google maps.

Basically that is the office for foreigners, room 102, 1st floor on Świetego Sebastiana street. It’s pretty near the Wawel behind the hotel Royal, so if you get lost head for the castle and ask. Also there is a photocopy place (ksero) in the same street near the kiosk. You might find yourself having to go there to get photocopies of whatever they decide to demand from you.

There’s also an office in Nowy Sącz if that’s nearer for you (ul. Jagiellońska 52).

What you need

  1. Forms. First fill out the 5 page form. As mentioned it is supposed to be downloadable from their website but my experience is different. You need 3 photocopies too. If you don’t have copies they’ll just send you out to get them. I should mention here that you even need to copy the blank sections that you are for them to fill in – I didn’t, and of course I was sent out to get photocopies. I did ask her what the point of photocopying empty pages was but she wasn’t having any of it.
  2. Passport with 1 photocopy of the page with your details on it.
  3. Proof that you have health insurance. This ones a bit tricker because it depends on whether you are working for a Polish company, are a student or still work for a UK company. I work for a UK company so just got the new European Health Insurance Card by filling out this form on the NHS website. Of course I needed 1 photocopy of it.
  4. Proof that you have financial means. This one is tricky because again it depends on whether you are a student, working locally, retired or whatever. Either they will ask for some crap such as a letter from a Polish bank confirming that you have a bank account, or they will ask for 1 photocopy of your credit card if you have one.
  5. Photocopy of your 3 month temporary registration.

Note that when you give them photocopies they will probably want to see the originals too, so bring them with you.

Because my wife is Polish they also asked me for our Polish marriage certificate. Because we got married in English we previously had to “announce” our marriage to the Polish authorities and they gave us a little yellow A5 document which seems to keep the officials happy. However I didn’t have this with me because when I rang I hadn’t been told this was necessary. Even if I had had it with me it would have been no good, because they said they wanted one less than 3 months old. We have been married 2 years and our Polish translation/certificate is already 1 year old.

Still following this?

So according to them I have to go all the way back to Opole (where we first lived when we came to Poland and where we announced our English wedding) to get another Polish certificate, to then bring to them in Kraków, even though I live nowhere near either place.

I pointed out to her politely that that was bollocks and I wasn’t going to, so she decided instead that photocopies of my credit cards would suffice, but that I should call up after 2 weeks to check it wasn’t going to cause a problem with my application.

MORAL OF THE STORY – I STRONGLY ADVISE YOU TO CALL UP AND ASK THEM EXACTLY WHAT YOU WILL NEED FIRST!

The Kraków office phone number is 012 392 1845.

What to do

Turn up. Queue. Get told that you have the wrong form or have filled it out wrong. Fill out the right form correctly. Go back to the photocopier place. Return to the office again. This time she decides that she wants photocopies of your credit card as you don’t have your Polish marriage certificate with you. Go back to the photocopier place. Return to the office again. Call after 2 weeks to check your application is OK. Wait for the Police to turn up at your door to ask you strange questions about your educational history, work experience and if you are a terrorist or some sort of nutter. Tell them “no”. Go back to the office again after 1 month to collect your certificate. Pay 1 złoty at the till first.

Springer’s Final Thought

This process has to be the biggest load of bureaucratical bollocks I have dealt with to date living in Poland. I really don’t see the point – if I am a terrorist why would I apply for a residence card to start with? If we’re all in the EU aren’t we free to live anywhere we want? What p*sses me off the most is that they ask you to bring photocopies with you – how primitive is that? What happens if you have made a mistake or have the wrong form? Would it not be more logical for them to check your forms and originals and then take whatever copies they want themselves?

Anyway that’s my rant over for now… please post your experiences of applying for the karta pobytu if you have any.

EDIT – I got a phone call on 13th May 2008 to say my karta pobytu was ready. I went back to the office in Krakow, paid 1 zloty and collected it. What an anticlimax – just a little bit of paper with a stamp :-(

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Posted in bureacracy, citizenship | 25 Comments »

Foreigners in Poland – registration “zameldowanie”

Thursday, February 28th, 2008

Thanks to Paweł from Polandian for his comments which I have used to update this blog post.

One of the biggest shocks about living in Poland for the average foreigner has got to be the bureaucracy. In fact if I have to list 3 downers about living here they would be:

  1. Unbelievable amount of bureaucracy to do anything in day to day life (register a car, buy a house, get a mobile phone, open a bank account, do anything at the post office…)
  2. Lack of indian and chinese take-aways.
  3. Did I mention the bureaucracy?

Unfortunately if you decide to live here (or already are) you will have to resign yourself to the fact that that is just the way it is and take it on the chin. The Poles don’t like it either and allegedly are slowly making things better. In fact because the procedures for doing things are in the process of change that can often add to the confusion – very often you are given out of date information or told different things by people or offices.

Anyway the first thing you will need to do is something called registration (zameldowanie). In what seems to me like an unreasonable breach of civil liberties you are legally required to be registered to an address to live here. If you aren’t registered then effectively you are just a tourist in Poland and not living here.

Many expats live in Poland for a long time and don’t bother to register – I didn’t until I had been here for at least 6 months. I have been told that it is legally compulsory but I don’t see how the authorities have any way to check how long you’ve been here or whether they even care that much about it.

So why register at all? Simply because at some point you might want to work here or buy a car or rent a flat and if you aren’t registered then you won’t be able to.

[UPDATE - I have been assured that you don't need to be registered to rent or buy property or to work locally. You don't need to be registered to by a car but you do if you want to register it to your name in Poland]

There are two types of registration – temporary (tymczasowy) or permanent (na stałe). As foreigners we aren’t currently allowed to register permanently. I know we are supposed to all be in the EU now, but it doesn’t feel that way.

[UPDATE - don't listen to the voices! Apparently if you have a karta pobytu then you can indeed register permanently according to the council in gdynia]

You can register temporarily for a maximum period of 3 months. That means every 3 months you will have to re-register. I have been told that I can register for up to 5 years but to do that I have to go to Kraków and frankly I can’t be bothered at the moment with the journey.

To register or re-register you will need to:

  • personally go during office hours (usually 8am – 4pm Mon-Fri) to the local town hall (urząd gmina) and find the office where they do registrations (zameldowanie).
  • take your passport
  • take with you the landlord or owner of the address at which you need to register – they need to sign that they agree for you to live there
  • take with you someone who speaks Polish if neither of you do. Don’t expect anyone to speak English, but be suprised if they do.

Don’t ask what happens if you work during office hours, are ill in hospital or elderly. The concept of dealing with these matters by post or internet is about as remote as me flying into space with a london oyster card.

Also don’t ask what happens if you don’t have anyone to sign you on to their address. If you are going to be renting a flat then this will be part of the procedure (and this also gives the landlord the power to evict you very easily by revoking your registration).

[UPDATE - an authorative source tells me that you don't necessarily need your landlord or property owner with you in person - if you have written entitlement to the property than that should suffice. In my experience that didn't work at my urząd miasta, but the next time I go to re-register I will try and do it with just my legal documents and will be ready to argue!]

When you do your registration they will ask you lots of apparently random questions such as what your parent’s names are. I don’t know why. Maybe if you’re naughty they will send a note home to them.

Finally expect a queue and to lose at least part of your day (if not all of it). That way if it only takes you an hour or so you will be pleasantly suprised rather than incredibly annoyed.

Let me know if you have anything to add, or what your experience of “zameldowanie” is like….

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Posted in bureacracy, residency | 15 Comments »