You might be confused as to whether or not you have working rights once you have a Life Partner or Spousal Visa. Both of these fall under the Relatives Temporary Permit category, but you can still add working rights. It doesn’t come automatically though. You first must have a job offer from a company. You need a work contract or a letter of motivation stating that the company wishes to hire you upon the outcome of you getting working rights added to you visa.

Once you have the job offer, you can contact us and we will provide you with a short, but new list of documents to fill out and we will lodge an entirely new application to revise the current spousal or life partner visa with the work endorsement. This requires your passport again and a small fee and the final result will show a 3 year visit visa that states on the bottom of the form “right to reside with SA spouse or life Partner and work at so and so company.” The reason it comes back as a visit visa is that Home Affairs doesn’t allow relatives category permits to have working rights.

If you change jobs, you need to undergo the process again as the working rights follow the job. If you need assistance or are not sure if you qualify to add working rights to your visa, give us a shout at New World Immigration.

sarah@nwisouthafrica.co.za