In general US citizens with our passports are pretty well received world wide and getting visas is not usually a big issue for me. We had no trouble in 2010-11 when we spent a year in Denmark, and when I first thought we would come to Spain for a year I naively assumed it would not be an issue if I a had a host who invited me here. I learned well before I left the US that this was not true.
Reading online about other people's experiences and hearing directly from other families that attempted to spend a year in Spain was a sobering experience. Some people gave up on their goal of spending a year in Spain, some people were successful in spending the year here but were not legal here after the first 90 days when a tourist visa ends, and some people managed to get legal status here, usually by hiring professional lawyers (or working for companies who hired lawyers) who helped them through the process.
I did contact both my host institute and the Spanish Consulate in Los Angeles. My host institute did have an attorney that they said could help me in the process. However it was still looking very daunting until we realized that J., R., and A. all had EU (Hungarian) passports. Everyone (the lawyer and the Consulate personnel) agreed that the best approach was for the the family to come as members of the EU, with me coming along as the spouse of an EU member (as I do not have an EU passport). We were led to believe that this would be fine.
The goal would be to come and get our NIE (national identity for foreigners) cards and numbers before the 3 months of our tourist visas would expire. The NIE is tied to many things here from the library card to the enclosed bicycle racks at train stations, to bank accounts, to cell phones, etc. Without it all these things are a big challenge.
We arrived at the end of August and we had some idea what types of documents we would need. We had our passports, birth certificates, marriage licenses, etc. Some were US documents, some were Hungarian documents, etc. We had understood that we needed a signed lease for an apartment as well, and had that, too. The first step was to establish that we had taken up residence in town. Armed with a few documents and some rusty Spanish, we went to city hall in Sant Cugat del Valles on 9 September and successfully received our Volant D'Empadronament document. Things seemed to be going well.
More research showed that for the next step, we would need appointments for each of us at the local branch of the National Police station. We found forms online to fill out, and learned that we needed to bring a wide range of documents that may or may not be requested. The Volant D'Empadronament, letters from my institute, letters from my university, letters from my bank noting that we had significant funds, letters that established that we had income, proof of health insurance, small passport style photos, marriage licenses, birth certificates, passports, etc. Technically all documents were supposed to be in Spanish, or translated officially and marked with an apostille, a special indication that a document from a foreign place is genuine, like a notarization, but more formal and harder to get.
This email I sent to the HR person at the institute highlights my confusion at the time:
It is a bit intimidating to figure out exactly what we need to provide. We have heard that it takes months to get an appointment at the location in Sant Cugat, but that some appointments are given out first come first serve in the mornings. People seem to go early and wait for many many hours to get in to have their turn. You are suggested to go with someone who speaks fluently, but who would want to go and wait hours with us to do that… Right now I am still waiting for my bank account to open. It was difficult to open an account without an NIE, but I need the account to complete the DKV (health insurance company) health insurance contract, so I am waiting for Santander (bank) to make my account this Friday. Then I think DKV will be able to make me a document showing that we have health insurance. I still don´t know exactly what they want in terms of financial documents. None of us are earning any income here in Spain. I have income from California, and of course I have bank accounts in the USA. If I do provide various documents from the USA, I think they need to be translated in order to be submitted as part of the package. Do you know if they have to be by specially approved translators, or is a google translation sufficient? My point here is that this is very difficult to figure out, and we hate to go to the Police Station without having everything in order, which would mean not getting the NIE and having to do the entire process all over again. I don´t know how much you can help me, but I would take any help you can provide. I don´t understand the relationship between the ICN2 (host institute) and (the lawyer they use), but she may have more knowledge about this than either of us. I don´t think I want to hire her to go with us to the meeting (although I understand that might be an option) but it would help to get her take on exactly what we need to bring with us to get the NIE. Perhaps you could discuss it with her?
We continued working on our documents. The health care was extremely slow despite the fact that I had started filling out forms for them before we left the US. We knew we did not have everything exactly the way it was supposed to be, but we went forward to try our luck. We chose to make the appointments in Sant Cugat on 24 October, which might be less finicky and busy than in Barcelona. We had made the appointments online and printed our appointment confirmation which is essential to even get into the waiting room. Then we waited our turn. Here is what I wrote after that meeting in an email to the HR person and the person who helped me at the International Welcome Point of the University.
Yesterday my family had our appointments at the Police Station in Sant Cugat. We were able to leave with NIE cards for my wife and my son who had EU passports. Unfortunately, the police were not at all interested in my documents. They were surprised that I did not have a visa, and insisted that I needed to go to Barcelona and do something there and then I could return to Sant Cugat. Irene and I will try and reach the number in Barcelona today that they gave me and see if we can make progress. I think that they may want me to get a TIE (a different card for foreigners) and possibly a residence permit for research and training.Much to our surprise, the cards issued to J. and A. were cheap cardstock with the critical NIE numbers in a tiny font on a patterned background. They were not really legible, and they did not have photos on them (I guess this is because they have genuine EU IDs that can serve this purpose). I should also mention that we asked a kind neighbor to join us for the appointment to help us with translation, that even after they approved the cards, you had to pay for the processing, but you cannot pay at the police station! Instead you have to go to a nearby internet cafe and fill out an online form, which you then print and take to a nearby bank, who you then pay. The bank prints and stamps something on your forms and you take these back to the police station where you do not need an appointment and then they give you the NIE cards.
I was pretty dejected about being rejected. I went back to the university support person who explained that I had needed a different type of appointment than J. and A. We also learned that for my appointment I would need to go to Barcelona and to have not just a Hungarian wedding certificate, but one that was issued in the past three months and had an official translation and an apostille.
J. had already made efforts to get a new Hungarian wedding certificate by going into Barcelona to the Hungarian Consulate. That was an adventure in itself since J. could not actually speak Hungarian or Spanish, the two languages that are used there. She met with the Hungarian Ambassador and with IT support staff person who had the best English of the regular staff. Getting the Hungarian wedding document was a major challenge. At one point the attorney who we were using as our official Hungarian translator was traveling to Budapest, and she said if we could give her a power of attorney document she could get it for us there. We tried that but she was unsuccessful.
Making the appointment in Barcelona was very difficult. I went online several times over a few different days only to be told there were no appointments available. Eventually, I got an appointment for 30 November. This would be beyond my tourist visa, but I was told not to worry that since I made the appointment before my 90 days, I would be okay. The difficulty getting this appointment caused me to actually change travel plans for Swansea because the UK is outside the Schengen Zone and I was concerned about being let back into Spain once I was over my 90 days. J. and I wanted support for the meeting in Barcelona and fortunately, my former student, E. who is living in Barcelona, was willing to go with us. He was incredibly helpful.
Here is what I wrote after that appointment in an email.
I wanted to update you on my visit to Barcelona for the EX-19 process towards the NIE. My wife and I were there with our documents and a former student of mine whose Castellano is quite good. Things went pretty well, but we are not done yet. They made me a document that shows that I am in the process, and even has my future NIE number on it, but that it is not usable yet. I am hoping it is enough that I can travel for research out of the Schengen zone, and still be allowed back into Spain without a problem. The big problem is that they will not recognize either of the wedding certificates that we provided even though we had one from the US and one from Hungary, both officially translated. They said we had to get a document that was less than 3 months old from Hungary, the EU country where my wife has citizenship. Our official Hungarian translator is a lawyer who actually was in Hungary two weeks ago tried to get this document for us, but was unable to do that. We have been to the Hungarian Consulate, where they helped order one for us, but it takes months to get. The Spanish government person did not believe that it could take months to get a new copy of the registration of our wedding, and suggested that there was some type of simpler polylingual wedding registry confirmation document that we could get in a week from the Hungarian Consulate. She said we should do this before the Christmas holidays so that we don’t get delayed so much. We went back to the Hungarian Consulate, and tried to explain this and they had no idea what we were talking about. They say we need to wait for the certificate we already ordered. There was a request that I bring more details about my health insurance than the simple letter with my health care policy numbers and a statement that I was insured. The wanted a detailed list of what my policy covers, which I had not brought with me. They also said we might need to have a different bank account that was in my wife´s name, rather than in my name for the financial part of the process, but our agent said she was not going to flag that, just warned us that it might be an issue further along the process. If either of you happens to know more about these EU wedding registry documents, I would be interested to hear about it from you.
The Hungarian Consulate reported that they had our new wedding certificate on 19 December, and J. was able to pick it up after we returned from Vienna. On 29 December we took this document and our full detailed description of our health insurance to the National Police Station in Barcelona. They accepted the documents and told us to wait for a response.
On 27 January I received a letter which I stated that I was approved and to make another appointment to visit the National Police Office to get my NIE. I was pretty excited about this, and went to make another appointment online, but found that I could not make one in Sant Cugat as J. and A. (and eventually R.) had done. I elected to go to another town Sabadell on the train line from both Sant Cugat and UAB where I work for 17 February. I thought that would be the end. J. and I went together, and things went well, although we got an earful from the person there about the difficulties her son has in the US when I made some comment about how many things we needed for this process. I got finger printed, etc. but then received a document from her saying everything was fine, but I had to come back again a month later when the actual NIE card would be ready! Again there was also a need to pay a fee through an online form endorsed by a bank. Before my card was ready, R. had come and completed her own NIE card (much easier since she had the EU passport).
Finally on 20 March, I went back to Sabadell and picked up my NIE card! Our whole family was now here legally! We went out for dinner to celebrate. It took me only 29 weeks (just over 200 days) to complete the process! My card is more formal with a photo and a finger print on plastic and is good for almost 5 years, but of course I am returning to the US in less than 4 months. What a long strange trip its been!
note from J - In my opinion this was a challenge, but it was still better than driving all over Los Angeles to the Hungarian Consulate and wherever we would have had to go to get the apostille. It is less time-consuming and more pleasant to take the train to Barcelona!
