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Costa Rica Residency – Obtaining Your Police Record

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Costa Rica Residency

After ten years of permanent Costa Rica residency (as well as marriage to a tica), this year I decided to become a citizen. I figured since I’ll be buried here, I might as well have the right to vote!

Granted, becoming a naturalized citizen is a bit different than getting a residency. Naturalization is a process that involves the TSE, or the Tribunal Supremo de Elecciones, as opposed to the Costa Rica immigration office.

Nevertheless, it is similar in the respect of needing to obtain a U.S. police record. The process of obtaining one of those that can be used for immigration or naturalization purposes in Costa Rica has long been a source of great frustration and confusion for expats.

These days, for purposes of Costa Rica residency or naturalization, they are asking for a national (or FBI) record, as opposed to one from your State of residence. I obtained mine earlier this year using the Outlier Legal Service in San Jose. I thought that was the best way, without having to actually make a trip to the U.S. Their service was good and I have no complaints, except for the fact that it’s damn expensive. To obtain the record, with the apostille affixed by the State Department, cost me $400. Then I had to pay another $100, or so, for the translation. So, all in all, I was out around $500 just to get this record.

I could have used Outlier for my birth certificate as well, but decided to use a cheaper channel. The problem for me came that by the time I submitted the documents, the police record was about 3 months and 10 days old. They told me at the TSE office that everything was fine. However, a few months later I received an email asking me to submit a new police record, since the one initially submitted had expired. And they only gave me a month to do it!

I immediately called Outlier to see what they could do for me. They offered me $100 off on doing the process all over again, to receive the exact same document, since not enough time has passed for me to get into the type of trouble that would add anything to it!

I decided to try another route and that is the real purpose for this post…

I need to tell you that I used to be a lawyer in another life. And I have a former law school classmate who’d served a stint as a U.S. Attorney. I thought to myself, surely he can help me. He’s now in private practice. I contacted him and he put me in touch with a private investigator he thought could help me. The P.I. simply sent me a link with instructions on how to get the record directly from the FBI.

I printed out the necessary forms from that link. I got an appointment with the police department here in Perez Zeledon for my fingerprints, using the official FBI form that I’d printed out. With that I sent the entire package by DHL to the FBI. They also had a form I could use to pay with a credit card. The charge was $18.

One thing I wasn’t sure about was getting the apostille affixed. That’s the only way the document would be legal for Costa Rica residency, or in my case, naturalization. The instructions from the link, which mind you are from the State Department, stated that if you are using the record for something like naturalization (i.e. for use by someone living out of country), and you made the request directly to the FBI, the State Department would affix the apostille, no extra charge. At least that was the way I read them. I asked the P.I. and he thought the same.

So, I included a cover letter stating the purposes of the request, along with a copy of my Costa Rica residency card. So far, I’m out a little less than $60 for the $18 FBI charge for the record, along with the $40 I paid to send it DHL.

I tracked the package and it did indeed make its way to the FBI headquarters in West Virginia. I waited patiently to see if they actually charged my card for the fee and they did! I sort of take it on faith that the charging of the card is a good sign.

I maintain a service here in Perez Zeledon with Aeropost. That gives me, for free, access to a P.O. Box in Miami. Once a letter or package reaches my Miami address, they immediately send it DHL to Costa Rica. So, I put that Miami address on the FBI form. I’m still waiting to get it back. The cost of the return trip will be another $40, more or less.

So, if all goes well I should shortly have my new record. I’ll have to get it translated again. I will certainly ask the girl in San Jose who did it the first time to cut me a break, since she can basically just use the former translation with a few edits.

I’ll be out around $100 total for obtaining the new record (not including translation cost). That’s a heck of a lot better than paying Outlier $300, or $400 less the $100 discount they offered. I just wish I’d known I could do it this way, relatively pain-free, the first go-round

I’ve seen numerous comments posted about obtaining a police record for Costa Rica residency on various Facebook groups. Some say you have to make the trip back to the States to get it done. Others highly recommend the Outlier service. Well, I thought I’d share my experience to let you know of a potentially much cheaper way.

Granted, I don’t have the record in hand just yet. I will update this post in the near future to let readers know the end result. However, as of now I am expecting it to be positive!

Oh, and by the way, the TSE did give me an extension to re-submit the document, since there was no way in hell that could ever happen within the month they originally gave me.

Oh, and another by the way, the expiration of documents submitted to the TSE is different than for those submitted to Immigration for Costa Rica residency. With the TSE it’s only 3 months, whereas it seems that it’s 6 months when dealing with immigration. That was a source of great confusion when I initially submitted and the reason everyone was saying that I was fine.

I wasn’t, but hopefully will be shortly!

Stay tuned…

Costa Rica Residency – Perpetual Tourist or Resident?

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Costa Rica residency

This post is not going to explain the ins and outs of obtaining a Costa Rica residency. I’ve written on that in the past. It’s complicated, but not so much. It’s not a bad idea to talk to a lawyer on that issue. Although I know of plenty who’ve handled it all on their own.

This post on Costa Rica residency is for those out there who choose not to become residents.

Believe me, there are more Costa Rica expats living in the country, full-time (or almost full-time), who aren’t residents than there are those who have achieved residency status.

So, what gives? What’s the big deal?

The main advantages of Costa Rica residency are as follows (in random order)…

1. You don’t have to leave the country every 90 days.
2. You can participate in the CAJA, or medical/social security system (but at a price).
3. You can more easily obtain certain services that require a “cedula” or government identification card.
4. You can acquire a Costa Rica driver’s license.

Granted, those are pretty significant advantages. But are they really?

There’s also the “moral” factor. For some folks it just doesn’t seem right to live in a foreign country as an illegal. If you don’t have residency and you are renewing your passport by leaving the country every 90 days, you aren’t technically “illegal”, but truthfully you are sort of gaming the system.

The deal is this…if you come to Costa Rica on a tourist visa, and for U.S. and Canadian citizens that simply means you entered with a passport from your home country (there are no other requirements for the visa), then you are allowed to stay in the country legally for 90 days. Also, you are allowed to use a valid driver’s license from your home country to drive on Costa Rica’s roads for that same 90 day period. After the 90 days are up, you’re an illegal.

Are you subject to deportation? Well, yes…however Costa Rica generally won’t do that as long as you keep your nose clean.

Recently the law was changed (effective April 20th of this year) wherein if you overstay your visa you are charged $100 for each month you overstay. When you exit the country you must pay up and if you don’t, you will be denied entry for 3 times the amount you overstayed. I don’t believe this is prorated, meaning that if you overstay by a day, you’re gonna owe $100. I’m not sure on that, but I have not read anywhere about a reduction in fine if you only overstay a fraction of an entire month.

Here’s an example of how this works: Let’s say you overstay your visa by 47 days (so 2 months). Well, when you check in at the airport for your flight home, someone somewhere (not sure who nor where) will be charging you $200. And if you don’t pay at that time, then you can’t come back into Costa Rica for 6 months. Got it?

You can avoid all this ugliness by just leaving the country before your visa period is up. You can of course go home, but you don’t have to. You could go to Panama or Nicaragua, both nice places to visit. How long do you have to stay outside the country? Technically you are supposed to stay outside for 72 hours, or 3 days. However, that’s not readily enforced.

I know of many a perpetual tourist who will simply go to the border, cross it, have a beer, and then cross immediately back to get his or her passport stamped and visa renewed for another 90 days. I never did it that way. I was a perpetual tourist for my first several years in Costa Rica. I always left for Nicaragua and I always stayed gone for the required 3 days. Heck, I loved doing it! But I’ve heard enough stories about folks getting away with far less time out to lead me to believe that the official 72 hour requirement is just not enforced.

What’s my recommendation on Costa Rica residency – perpetual tourist or resident?

Well, I would have to say that if you easily qualify for residency, either due to a pension back home, or the fact that you’re investing $200,000 in Costa Rica real estate (which incidentally will qualify you, your wife and minor children all for that same $200K), then go ahead and go for it. However, if that’s a big problem for you, then the perpetual tourism route is certainly viable. Bearing in mind that it will now cost you to overstay your visa.

Back when I was a perpetual tourist I overstayed often. Usually because I was running my own business and the date I was supposed to leave wasn’t always commensurate with my ability business-wise to just up and leave. So, I would overstay for a week or two (sometimes even more). You won’t really be able to do that anymore without having to pay a price.

It seems that Costa Rica is trying to discourage perpetual tourism, so more loophole closes could be in the plans.

I was talking to a friend the other day, a guy who lives half the year in Costa Rica and the other half in Canada (so, not really a perpetual tourist as I would understand the term to mean). He said he didn’t understand why Costa Rica didn’t make the tourist visa valid for 6 months, rather than 3…apparently as they do in Panama? I agree that would be a welcome change, but it doesn’t seem to me that Costa Rica is going in that direction when it comes to their immigration policies.

For now perpetual tourism is still alive and well in Costa Rica. Who knows, however, what the future has in store?

Welcome to the Border – May I take your Order?

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No, this post has nothing to do with Taco Bell.  I used to be what we call in Costa Rica a “perpetual tourist.” 

That’s one of those “types” who lives in Costa Rica on a tourist visa and just leaves every so-often (every 90 days as of the writing of this old post) to renew said visa…

I came here in 2001 on a business deal and for the next two years was traveling back and forth almost every month, therefore the thought of establishing “residency” never even occurred to me.  Then in 2004 I started a tourism business. For the first two years of that business I still traveled back and forth, so residency just didn’t seem necessary. Then in 2006 I made my permanent move and finally residency became important to me. 

So I got an attorney who promised that he could make my residency sail through the bureaucracy like grease through a goose.  A year later I was told that it wasn’t going to be as easy as first thought.  At that point I was frustrated and decided to hire another, supposedly more knowledgeable, attorney, who again told me pretty much the same.  A year later, still no residency.  By the end of 2008 I was still an f’ing tourist living in Costa Rica! 

As a perpetual tourist I had to leave the country every thee months for three days in order to renew my tourist visa.  I could go anywhere I chose, as long as I crossed the border and stayed put for three days, or seventy-two hours.  That is why there is that question on the immigration form you sign when you enter the country whereby you swear that you have been out of the country for seventy-two hours (look closely next time, it is there).

This was all fine and good in a way, as it kinda forced me to get to know our neighboring countries, like Nicaragua, Panama and even Colombia, which I visited the first time in 2008.  These places are actually very special too, despite political and social problems that still linger (especially in Nicaragua and Colombia).  It’s like getting to take a little mini-vacation every three months.

But the truth is, Costa Rica has an immigration problem.  I have heard there are some 500,000 illegal Nicaraguans living within these borders, not to mention Colombians, Panamanians, Dominicans, etc.  Proportionately speaking, the problem is even greater than in the U.S. 

I didn’t want to be part of that problem.

I am still trying to fight through the bureaucratic maze of Costa Rican Immigration and get my residency (although I really think at this point an “honorary residency” is in order…sort of along the lines of the “national convenience” decree that was issued to the billionaire Steve Case).  When I do finally get my residency, I plan to continue taking my little vacations to neighboring countries (I really would like to visit Peru). But at least I won’t carry around the stigma of being a “mojado indocumentado” any longer. And, at least, I won’t “have to!”

P.S.  For those of you out there who acquired your Costa Rican cedulas painlessly and effortlessly – GET A LIFE!

P.S.S. I did finally get my residency around 2009 (I think) and then 10 years later, became a full-fledged Costa Rican citizen.

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