I was informed that the initial work permit application submitted on my behalf earlier this month was sent to SEM for further review. Is it a bad sign the the Zurich authorities didn’t approve it outright? They had the discretion to bypass SEM due to the change in law that occurred this February. It might be too soon for anyone to have any insight but I’m curious as to what people think.
Standard procedure. dont worry.
Commune, Canton and Country have to approve. The SEM are checking that you are not a spy or international black hat.
It’s actually a good sign as it appears both the Commune and Canton are in agreement.
That is, unless you are a spy or an international black hat.
Commune has nothing to do with it since they wouldn’t know where they would be living in the canton.
Canton has to give its approval first and then it’s sent up to Federal so they can check it meets their criteria which is different from the cantonal one.
https://www.sem.admin.ch/sem/en/home…ensablauf.html
Received an update today that SEM has made their decision and I’ll have the results within the next couple of days. I was assured by HR that it wasn’t a bad sign that they didn’t indicate whether it was approved or not over the phone. I’ll update the post again when I receive final word.
My permits were approved! I received word from HR that my file is approved in their online system as of today and that I should receive my visa authorization form soon.
Summary of my application:
This was an initial permit for my family and me for an intercompany transfer from the US to Zürich. My application was initiated by an immigration specialist hired by my company that sent my application materials to the authorities at the end of May. The application was for me and for family reunification at the same time. The application sat pending at the AWA (initial canton level) for a little less than 5 weeks. It was then forwarded to SEM (federal). The application sat pending at the SEM office for almost 3 weeks. I’m not sure how long it took to receive approval from the Migrationsamt des Kantons Zürich.
I’ll provide further updates as I receive them. I really appreciated reading posts like this as I was waiting for my decision so I want to pay it forward.
Intercompany transfer permits are normally very easy.
My visa authorization was approved on August 9th but I received notification about the update over the weekend. I hope to have our visas by the end of the week!
Congrats! It has been helpful to read your process. I am also from the USA and the company I was hired with sent my paperwork to the Bern canton on 7/25 but have yet to hear any news unfortunatly. I hope to hear soon.
Question, upon receiving word of your permit authorization, did you submit the visa d application to your area's Swiss embassy within the States or did the company take care of this for you?
I apologize for not getting back to you sooner but I did not receive a notification of your response. We actually did not have to send in any paperwork to have our visas issued. We only had to send in our passports, a passport photo and a copy of the visa authorization from the Swiss authorities. We received our visas back within 3 days.
Just to complete the information about our process, we received our visas within 3 days of their receipt at the Swiss consulate. It took over 14 days to get an appointment with the residence office in the City of Zürich and another month to get a biometric appointment for our residence cards. We were issued a B permit.