Suzhou New District opens an integrated service window for foreigners' work and residence permit applications. [Photo/suzhou.gov.cn]
Foreigners living in Suzhou New District in East China's Jiangsu province can now apply for their work permits and residence permits via an integrated service window, as the district recently streamlined services for foreign residents.
Foreigners previously had to shuttle between two different departments, with one being responsible for handling work permit services and the other for residence permit services.
With the new integrated service window, foreigners can now handle both processes at one place. Processing time was also shortened from 25 working days to merely seven. The permits will be express delivered to the applicant free of charge by the local public security department.
Brian and Sharla, two foreign teachers at the Suzhou Science and Technology Town Foreign Language School, said the new service window has significantly sped up the process and documents now only need to be submitted once.
By 2021, a total of 11,000 foreigners in Suzhou had obtained work permits, ranking fifth among cities in China. 4,630 were high-caliber foreign talents, which accounted for 54.3 percent of all high-caliber talent in Jiangsu province.
In addition to Suzhou New District, other districts and county-level cities governed by Suzhou, such as the Suzhou Industrial Park, the cities of Kunshan and Changshu, and Wujiang district, have all opened an integrated service window for foreigners' work permit and residence permit applications.
