Asia

Taiwan To Offer Rewards To Limit Overstayers

Taiwan’s Ministry of the Interior (MOI) Thursday announced a new scheme under which foreign nationals overstaying their visa’s can be reported to the government.

Speaking in Taipei, the MOI also said a new reward system would be introduced with up to NT$ 20,000 payable to those reporting overstayers upon arrest.

Long a haven of overstayers and ‘visa-run’ expats who typically renew three month tourist visas with a quick trip to Hong Kong or elsewhere in Asia before returning to Taiwan to work illegally, the new system is being introduced as a three month amnesty on illegal overstayers comes to an end in late June.

Payments for those reporting overstayers will start at NT$ 2,000 for the detention of a single overstayer, NT$ 5,000 for between 4 and 6 overstayers and NT$ 10,000 should 7 – 9 overstayers be detained by authorities.

The maximum reward of NT$ 20,000 will only be paid out if 10 or more overstayers are arrested.

There are several limitations on those looking to report overstayers, however, with employers and those working with overstayers through the same employment agency unable to collect the rewards.

Similar programs do already exist in Taiwan under the Ministry of Labor to help catch undocumented workers although no immediate mention of how the systems would interact was was made.

Mark Buckton

Mark is a journalism vet of 20 years with most of those years spent in Tokyo, Japan, as a columnist for The Japan Times and numerous other publications. His work has appeared on CNN, in the BBC, NPR, and in several dozen other media forms and publications across five continents.