The 5 year thing you heard sounds like misinformation to me. Actually it is a permanent visa on your passport. It never expires but your passport does and when that happened you get it restamped sand as 13a visa. You get an SRRV ID card similar to the ACR card that 13a visa holders get except you gave the option for a 3 year renewal of the card rather than an annual renewal. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
It is a permanent non-immigrant visa, as permanent as the 13a immigrant visa. With both visas you get a permanent passport stamp but you must renew the ID cards that come with it; the only way to avoid renewal that is through Philippine citizenship. With SRRV though, 1) you can renew for 3 years (as we do) and 2) can renew through your marketer by mail (as we do) and never have to go to a BI office. More recently with the covid lockdowns, SRRV has been shown to be not as reliable as once thought. If we had been overseas while the lockdown was started, we never could have been allowed to return like 13a holders can do. This would have been quite disappointing to people who owned property and a business here. We were lucky to have returned in mid-January. We are considering going for the 13a now for that reason, but that requires the spouse to swear-in for dual citizenship which she has resisted in the past. But we get our deposit back. It may be something to consider doing because it is rather important to know you can come back if you leave PI for an extended time period. PRA says they are appealing to BI to change their policy but so far no go. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Anyone know if a 13A card can be renewed in a foreign consulate. Mine soon expires and I was hoping to be back to renew it in December but that looks out of the question.
Phil, your 13a card expires when your visa expires.. if you cannot renew because you are out of the country they will charge you 5,000 peso's per year fine.. No big deal..
I don’t know 13a at all but; 1. You said “13a card expires when visa expires”. 2. But I thought 13a visa was for permanent residence, on passport, it only expires when passport expires, correct? Then needs to be re-stamped to new passport when issued (maybe not, I am just guessing). 3. If ACR card does expire, it would follow from your statement that visa must have expired (It does not). I suspect ACR Card may expire but 13a visa does not expire. But without ACR card you are disadvantaged but still have legal visa status. I know the SRRV. You have to show both the visa on current passport and the unexpired SRRV card to get the boarding pass without onward ticket. But if you are expired you could still get on the plane if you buy an onward ticket and get in on an airport issued tourist visa, in normal times. Expired SRRV coming in in a tourist (Balikbayan for some of us) will of course not result in a fine. With SRRV you just have them renew the card when you get here albeit as a tourist, no fine. But the permanent SRRV is always there, it never expires unless you cancel it yourself. I suspect that 13a would be similar. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
13A holder here. You are correct that the Visa does not technically expire unless the marital situation changes. But the ACR-I is different. It must be renewed every 5 years, cost $50 US. If it expires it can be renewed with a penalty, but you cannot even do an annual registration if it has expired, you have to go and get it renewed before and then pay everything at the same time. I know, forgot to renew mine once. The BI people were very obliging and understood that I am old, don't travel much and tend to forget.
Thanks. The 5 years is very reasonable in my opinion. SRRV renewal lasts 3 years max at $30.00 or so. I don’t know what happens if it ever expires; if I had to I could use courier mail to our marketer and renew from overseas (no problem). Marketers will do that for a reasonable fee and no need for PRA member to be present. After the latest ban, where returning SRRV holders got caught up in the covid restrictions, clearly 13a is more like what we think of as a US permanent resident green card but SRRV is more like a long term tourist visa with less reliability. SRTV. Like I say, maybe we will have to bail out of that and go for 13a because we must annually return to the US for family, medical and other reasons as want to have some level of confidence in returning. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Nope. I have had to renew my ACR card for the 13A visa before. the card clearly has a use by date when it has to be renewed. Its just a simple matter and is usually done in Cebu but this time mine could expire before I get back. I am expecting when I present it to Immigration when I do come back and it it has expired that they will say you cannot come in on an expired cad and have to do it via short stay visa then go Cebu to sort it all out. All I was wondering was if the Philippine consulate here can do it. Easier if I give them a call I think. Just though someone here may have experienced this.
1. I did my SRRV in 2016, can renew for 5 yrs now,, no new deposit. Needed to leave my passport with them first time, got it back in a month. 2. PRA Cebu office better than most gummint offices in the states. For renewal, paid fee at Land bank sent original deposit slip to Cebu with SAE via LBC, every thing else done via email. First deposit in '16 done at PNB, scammed into setting up a savings acoount, closed it after a year. Was scrounging pennies to do the $10k, Jackie at PRA Cebu asked if i was military and had a DD214, I said "yes" and she said, "You're in luck, it's only $1400," first gummint office that ever saved me $8600...." 3. Every Pension and SocSec i have ever heard of issues a 1099R every January. 4. NBI (National Bureau of Investigation) office is behind provincial capital, go there. Can't imagine they wouldn't let you in if on "gummint biz" 4. The ONLY time I have been stopped for being 76 is when going into bank or mall. Asawa can do the bank. I'm sure if you told guard it was a government required visit, they'd let you in too. We got a letter from barangay captain in april saying we had no help, we need to go out, works like a charm. 5. Picture taking shop would not stop you because of age, 99% sure of that.
Got our SRRV in 2017 in Manila. They told us max renewal period was 3 years at the time. If it is now 5 years and the marketer told me wrong that is good news for us as we will renew 5 years next time. But why would you say no new deposit needed? I would assume that the deposit is a one time thing. Nothing in paper ever said it must be increased at renewal (?) Yes, you leave your passport with them as it must be stamped, just like 13a. We made similar deposit with BOD in Manila. Bank required PRA letter to authorize opening the account so there was no issue about scam savings account; I was with PRA marketer at bank when opening it and no pressure to open secondary accounts. We had already investigated deposit amount before applying; you are ex-military and you got a discount. I am not ex-military but we get the same exact low deposit because wife is a former Filipina; we only needed the $1500 deposit amount. It is called the “balikbayan” SRRV (not officially). I think yours is a courtesy SRRV and ours is called extended courtesy SRRV. You make a good point that people should investigate to see what your deposit will be; it might be much lower than you think. Absolutely, SS 1099 available online and most pensions are available online too. No comment on that. Covid was not an issue at the time we made those visits in Manila. Actually it is not an issue now to my thinking since PRA has been shut down anyway but I will not get involved in that discussion. When this is all over, people can choose to work through Manila or Cebu. If you choose Cebu, know that it should be the same thing except more delays because the Cebu office acts as an intermediary to the Manila office and dies everything through Manila. Also, if you have the free services if a pra marketer, working through Manila can actually be rather fun as a mini-vacation, staying at a nice hotel in makati and going out to see the sights at night...if is really a beautiful city and not much more expensive than going to Cebu. It was a pretty good trip, we stayed 5 days in Manila, went to 2 or 3 places per day to get everything, starting with BOD, then US Embassy, then NBI, DFA (red ribboning), whatever else, the physical exam and finally PRA at the Citibank building in makati. The marketer or her assistant accompanied us to all agencies and put us at the head of the lines. We made a second shorter trip to PRA a month later to pick up passports and cards. We could have had that courier mailed but preferred to make a second visit to Manila. But after all that, it appears that BI considered 13a to be a more preferable visa in that, in the case of covid travel bans, 13a will get you back in the country whereas SRRV WILL leave you stranded. We of course do not know that at the time and most of us assumed the 2 visas were treated equally. They are not. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
