Romania Immigration Services

Newland Chase offers full support with all aspects of corporate immigration to Romania. Please find an overview of the typical corporate immigration processes below. Every situation is unique, so please do get in touch, either through your usual Newland Chase contact or using the details on the right hand side of the page. Our immigration experts will be glad to discuss your needs in greater detail.

Immigration Summary

The Work Permit (Local Hire) is also known as 'Employment or Labour Approval' and is for employees who are hired directly by the Romanian entity, i.e. are on Romanian payroll and contract.

The Work Permit (Assignee) process is also known as 'Secondment Approval' and is for employees who are assigned to the Romanian entity while remaining on home payroll and contract, for a maximum period of one year out of five years. Companies do not need to be linked by common ownership, and there is no requirement for the employee to have been employed by the sending company for any minimum time.

There is no local labour market search required for this process (unlike the local hire process), so the overall processing time will be reduced by approximately 2-3 weeks.

The Intra-Company Transfer Permit (EU Directive 2014/66) process is a temporary residence authorisation for intra-company transfers (ICT). It is only applicable to assignees falling into management/specialist or trainee categories sent to Romania for over 90 days from outside the EEA and has a maximum total duration of stay of three years for managers and specialists and up to one year as a trainee. The applicant must have been employed for at least three months (for trainees) or six months (for managers/specialists) by the sending company or group of companies immediately preceding the date of the intra-corporate transfer application, and must be able to prove at least three years of professional experience relevant to the activities performed by the Romanian host company.

ICT permits under Directive 2014/66 allow mobility within EU member states - i.e. work permission is not required for EU ICT permit holders to work in other member states for less than 90 days and a streamlined Mobile ICT permit application may be applicable if working in other member states for longer than 90 days.

The Assignment from Within the EEA process is for a non-EEA national who is employed and contracted by a home entity in the EEA country and sent on short-term assignment to Romania, in which case they do not need a work permit. Although Romania does not recognise the Van der Elst ruling this process is similar to the VDE routes in other EEA countries.

The Blue Card is an EU-wide (with some exceptions) immigration process for highly skilled employees with a local job offer in the destination country. In Romania, the salary must be at least twice the average gross monthly salary for a similar position in Romania and the process is an Employment Approval (Highly Skilled Workers) followed by a Blue Card residence permit application. The category offers some concrete benefits to the applicant.

EU/EEA/Swiss nationals employed in or assigned to Romania do not need a work permit. However, if the stay in Romania will be longer than 90 days, an EU Registration Certificate should be applied for and either a local labour contract should be registered, or a notification of the assignment should be submitted to the Territorial Inspectorate of Labour.