APPLICATION
According to the new Immigration Law No. 21.325, the National Migration Service (Servicio Nacional de Migraciones) is responsible to process all applications. This new service is expected to standardize procedures throughout the country and shorten processing times. In addition to this central service, there are regional offices to support it. This task also corresponds to the consulates.
The National Immigration Service itself reports to the Ministry of the Interior and Public Security. It is also responsible for keeping the new registry of foreigners, which includes all foreigners in the country. Likewise, the tasks and allocation in the hierarchy of the Policía de Investigaciones (PDI) have changed. A residence permit issued by the National Migration Service, stamped or issued after February 12, 2022, no longer has to be registered by the PDI. On the other hand, residence permits emitted by the consulates must be registered regardless of their date of issuance and stamp, since they are subject to Decree No. 1.094, in force since 1975, and not to the current Law No. 21.325. This also implies changes in the application process for the Chilean identity card.
To apply for a permit, go to the website of the new migration service:
https://tramites.extranjeria.gob.cl/
To achieve the set goal - to shorten the processing of applications in a fair and fast way - all documents uploaded with the application must meet the most stringent requirements. If they are insufficient, incorrect, illegible, incoherent, not translated into Spanish or English, not legalized, and/or not apostilled, a precise deadline is given to the applicant to upload new documents. If the applicant does not meet this deadline, the application will be removed from the system and the entire application process must be started again. The documents also need to be in the correct format, possibly merged, but on the other hand, they cannot exceed a certain volume in megabytes, since the system prevents an upload in this case. The National Migration Service will give a precise hint of the missing or non-compliant documents. If you upload your application again, you have to make sure that none of the documents has expired.
When the foreigner satisfactorily complies with the requirements for the subcategory of Residencia Temporal in question, the Migration Service will provide him/her with the electronic document certifying the application. In cases where, for any reason, the interested party is unable to digitally download said document, he/she may go to the corresponding consulate to receive assistance in obtaining the electronic document.
Holders of a Permiso de Residencia Temporal, who are outside Chile, are given ninety calendar days to enter the country in this category, from the date of downloading the permit from the electronic system of the Migration Service. If such action is not undertaken after one hundred and twenty working days from the date on which the foreigner is notified by e-mail that his/her permit is available for download, that permit will lose its validity. If the foreigner is interested in applying again for a Permiso de Residencia Temporal, he/she will have to submit another application according to the general rules. The validity of Permisos de Residencia Temporal issued outside Chile will be effective from the date of entry into the country. This date must be registered by the border control authority in the National Register of Foreigners.
In cases where the Migration Service requests the assistance of consulates, the consulates have 15 days to report the results to the Migration Service.