Unlike Urufish who received a notice about his Residencia Definitiva we were always told by Immigration to just keep checking back.The process started almost two years ago. First we had to prepare a short letter explaining that we wanted residency and why. After we submitted that letter we were told to come back in 10 days and we'd be told if we had been accepted and could apply for residency. Someone told me that part of the process is no longer required.
We were accepted at the first step and then had to collect all the information required; birth certificates, marriage certificate, income statement and police records. The police record requirement varies depending on your nationality and where you have lived.
All the certificates need the authentication by the Uruguayan embassy in the country they are from, authenticated by the Minister of Exterior and translated to Spanish. Once all that is done they are filed in the Vital Statistics registry.
Depending on your circumstances immigration may get your police records for you, or you may have to go through the whole authentication process yourself!
My wife was prepared (or I guess she isn't a heavy duty criminal like me) so she had her police record (or lack there of) with her and completely authenicated so once we made the official filing of the required papers she was given a temporary residence id good for a year.
For me... they just knew I was some kinda of terrible person, so I was sent off to the interpol office... It only took them 3 months to clear me. That wasn't enough. They also needed a police report from every placed I had lived in the last five years.
Fortunately, immigration took it upon themselves to gather that information. A process that took only 7 or 8 months! They also do a local investigation to make sure you've not been a bad boy or girl in Uruguay.
The immigration department never sent us a letter or called. They always suggested we check back in 2 weeks, 1 months, 2 months, or however long they figured a process would take.
When we checked back and all my police reports were in we were informed of the next problem... the income document was only valid for 6 months. We'd need to have a new report preprared. When we returned with that I was asked if I wanted my temporary residence identification and said yes.
To be clear, once you start the residence process there are no problems with your staying in Uruguay (or not) while it is processed. Ok, back to my temporary resident id. Well, after checking with the powers that be I was informed that, no, I could not have a temporary ID as the entire process would be complete in just one month and my permanent ID would be ready.
That one month ultimately turned into over a year! When my wife's temporary ID expired they would not renew it as the various documents expire and need to be refiled and I guess the timing was just wrong.
I think different people in immigration examine the papers and have different problems with them so you make changes to satisfy one person and then someone else reviews them and wants something else changed.
A while back we were told that everything was completely and only the signature of the minister of the interior was needed and that would take a month. Someone else told us that it would take 3 months for that signature). Yesterday we checked and and it was all ready (looks like it had been approved mid May).
Now the process for getting our permanent resident id cards are completely different as I never had a temporary id and my wife did. It is also important to point out that although my wife's temporary ID expired almost a year ago, immigration needed to see the old card yesterday!
To get my id card is a several step process. First, we had to get a copy of my Uruguyan Birth Certficate. Yes, even though I was not born in Uruguay or from Uruguayan parents, I now have a official Uruguayan birth certificate.
Later in the week I go for my photo to be taken and pick up my ID the following week. My wife was told she needed to go in Mid July for hers.... or could go today at 6am and stand in line in hopes of getting it sooner!
Actually, I wasn't there yesterday... my wife was. But, I was today because on hers they used only one last name and her expired cedula had two and they wouldn't give her a new cedula unless the name from immigration matched the name from the old cedula!For some reason they wanted to make the cedula appt for her for mid July, but gave her the option to wait in line at 6am today to get an appointment for tomorrow. So we both go to get our cedulas tomorrow, and she actually gets hers I will have to wait another 5 days to get mine!
Correct, I never had a temporary cedula, and finally get the definitiva (permanent) ID. I did get the permisos for exit and rentry since day one.
My wife called the office at Geant and they wouldn't help either of us. Maybe it is more complicated for us since her temporary cedula expired almost a year ago (and they woundn't renew it) and I never had one.
I think the hundred pesos more is so that you can walk out with your cedula the day they take your photo... rather than going back to pick it up the following week.
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