Chile Forum

I've only done this one other time as I usually go to Mendoza or fly out and that first time was many years ago (maybe 2002 or 3ish) at the Extranjeria in S A N T I A S C O. Yes, that huge, confusing, noisy room filled mainly with Peruvians, Bolivians, other South Americans and maybe Caribe extranjeros where everyone is just a number.

So this morning I walk into the Gobernacion Provincia de San Antonio building and speak to the receptionist. She asks for my passport and logs me into their Windows based system and then tells me to go upstairs to the Extranjeria office. I enter that wing and it is just a normal appearing office waiting room with a secretary. One set of windowed doors leads to the head/governor or whatever of the province, two other offices appear to support that office as one is labeled Jefe del Cabinete or something like that and the large office directly across from the secretary is the Extranjeria which is just a large, one person office with a lawyer's or doctor's office feel and character to it. That office and the lady working in it is the Extranjeria for the entire province of San Antonio, V Region! The renewal process is now automated and the only time I needed to put pen to paper was to sign the quadruplicate form that the computer spit out. She did seem to have trouble with the data entry process as she took 25 minutes or more trying to figure out something. She apparently spoke little to no English or did not attempt to use it if she did know when asking me the questions to fill in the computerized prorroga de turismo form. After paying at the nearby bank, returning and waiting for ten minutes as she was apparently still struggling with something on the computer, I finally got my stamped prorroga. I also attempted to pry out of her a peso figure for my locale to qualify for the pension version of the one year temporary residence visa.

I'm good till the end of May unless I can apply for a visa before then . . . .

eeuunikkeiexpat wrote:... The renewal process is now automated and the only time I needed to put pen to paper was to sign the quadruplicate form that the computer spit out ...

The lady working in the Temuco Extranjeria office has two printers attached to her computer, and you know what, she can have both of them working simultaniously!.. So, while the first one is spitting out the 'application' form, the other one (an old matrix printer) is producing a paper, that you must take to a bank to pay the $100 renewal fee (that was equal to 60,102 pesos, that you have to pay at ServiPAG, that is a 2-minute walk from the Extranjeria office, but that may have a 45-minutes long queue).

I have had the "pleasure" of experiencing both the Chilean system and the old INS in the US. Not much difference. Both systems treat "aliens" as fourth class citizens. And the treatment depends a lot on the alien's skin colour or the alien's country of origen. I was surprised to see that this was true both in the States and in Chile.
My wife and I went to the Intendencia de Valparaiso to pay the fine for overstaying her tourist visa and we had a similar experience as the one described. We have been in Santiago's Policia Internacional Office. I can assure you that all those throngs of people are no different than what I saw and shared long waiting hours with at the INS offices in Saint Paul, MN. I spent there what I felt was half my life when I obtained my American "green card", so many years ago. And talk about paperwork, misinformation, denials, appeals,etc. Becoming a US citizen was easier, but by no means a cake walk.
It looks to me as if the purpose of the INS in those days (I have no experience with the new system except for the security screens at airports) and the purpose of Extranjeria in Chile today ( I cannot speak for other countries) is to keep the riff-raff away, and one is "riff-raff" until proven otherwise. And who defines riff-raff? I do believe that both systems, from what I have seen, have a deep undercurrent of racism and of economic exclusion.Chile appears to have a better economic status than some of the surrounding countries, so like in the States citizens of those countries are viewed as suspect regardless of their educational level.
I realize that like my wife, most of you have not experienced the ugliness of dealing with immigration in the States, in particular being a "non European, non Caucasian ( i.e. white)" immigrant and just because of her "gringo" status, generally she gets treated very well in Chile. Most people in our small community go out of their way to help her (or try to practice their English speaking with her), nor have you had the "pleasure" of being looked at as a "retarded" citizen because of not being a native English speaker.
I keep on reminding her that Lake Woebegone (Garrison Kieller, Prairie Home Companion, National Public Radio) is fictitious.

I forgot to mention that the cost of extending a tourist visa for an extra 90 days is about US$100, while the fine for overstaying one's visa is about US$40. This cost (the later) goes up if one overstays more than once (habitual offender, ha). The fines are set yearly by Extranjeria and can be found on the Internet. It does matter how long one overstays, fines varying by how long one has been in the country with an expired visa. Apparently there are no other penalties or problems reentering the country later on. Try that back home (in the States)! One caveat, once one pays the fine one has to leave the country within 10 days. What did I learn from this: a) If one is going to overstay, do it for as long as one needs to (or wants to) to avoid the 10 day countdown; b) the procedure seems to be the same to extend a visa or to pay a fine for overstaying i.e. one goes to an office that seems to be taken out of a Dostoyevski or Kafka novel which is open only from 9-1, gets a voucher to go to a nearby bank (no cash accepted), returns with a money order. Then, in our experience it took about 30-40 minutes to enter data into computer that finally spitted out 4 forms that we had to sign.
Incidentally, at the airport it appeared that no one had any idea what to do with the form that was given to us and it took another 10 minutes of entering data into the computer before we could go through.
One thing that may be helpful and that we found out after the odyssey that kept me in the dog house for a couple of days (remember, I was born in Chile, so I am personally responsible for all the maladies of the country) AT THE INTENDENCIA DE VALPARAISO, EXTRANJERIA ONE CAN SET UP AN APPOINTMENT. And I did notice that the people working there kept pretty much to the schedule. I, using some atavistic Chilean skills, simply pushed to the front of the line!!
I presume that all extranjeria offices accept appointments.

Gracia' for the very detailed experience.

The payment process appears to be different even between different offices within the same Region as I did pay in cash to a bank and brought only a proof of payment back to the office to complete the extension transaction.

I've been in that Santiago Extranjeria it was not too bad, only a little more crowded and hot than an average California DMV office.

eeuu, I think that the meaning was as follows: "no cash accepted at the Extranjeria office". So that one must go to a bank, where they certainly would accept payment by cash.

When reading various posts that discuss overstaying, it seems that no one is telling us whether or not the details with regards to the most recent (if not all) overstays, and maybe the details of all the previous entry/exit dates, are displayed all together on the computer screen of the immigration officer at the border, so, they [probably] have the ability to prevent you from entering the country just based on their opinion about the number [and maybe the duration] of the previous entries, exits, and/or overstays.

RuneTheChookcha wrote:eeuu, I think that the meaning was as follows: "no cash accepted at the Extranjeria office". So that one must go to a bank, where they certainly would accept payment by cash.

But he talked about bringing a money order to Extranjería??

RuneTheChookcha wrote:When reading various posts that discuss overstaying, it seems that no one is telling us whether or not the details with regards to the most recent (if not all) overstays, and maybe the details of all the previous entry/exit dates, are displayed all together on the computer screen of the immigration officer at the border, so, they [probably] have the ability to prevent you from entering the country just based on their opinion about the number [and maybe the duration] of the previous entries, exits, and/or overstays.

Exactly. And because we don't know, why push your luck? And even if it doesn't mean anything NOW, that can change in the future.

If you go to the Extranjeria website, then search for "Tabla de Sanciones", it will bring up a page where you can dowload the chart for overstay multas. From 1-100 days is CLP$24.409.

LeahFawn wrote:If you go to the Extranjeria website, then search for "Tabla de Sanciones", it will bring up a page where you can dowload the chart for overstay multas. From 1-100 days is CLP$24.409.

you could of waited until 3.59pm to post that message, that way you would of been exactly 2 years to the minute after the last post!

LOL, I was thinking the same thing... but I did a search for the multas, and thought at some point someone else would, so might as well share (even if it was a few years later!)