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New immigration laws will go into effect March 1
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff

The nation's new immigration law will go into effect March 1, officials said Tuesday. The law was published in the La Gaceta official newspaper Tuesday, triggering the clause in the law that says it will go into effect six months after publication. The law is structured substantially different than previous versions. One item of interest to expats is that persons who overstay their visa will be fined $100 for each month they have been illegal in the country and they will be barred from entering Costa Rica for a period equal to the time they stayed here illegally.

The law also allows North America tourists to extend their 90-day stay for 90 more days with the payment of $100. This is important for the so-called snowbirds who come to Costa Rica for the north's winter season and may want to stay four or five months. Under the current law they would have to leave the country to renew their visa. The new law also requires those foreigners living in the country to join the Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social. The law says that those renewing their residencies must show that they have been enrolled in the Caja the entire time since residency was granted. The process for doing this was not specified in the law.

The Policía de Migración is beefed up in the new law, and the duties of the force are spelled out. One obligation is to check on the legality of persons working in Costa Rica and to enter workplaces to do so. The law specifically says that pensionados and rentistas have the right to work and earn money on their own behalf. These so-called residentes temporales also have to enroll in the Caja, said the law. However, the law also says that an employer has the obligation to make sure an employee has the legal right to work and is assessed a fine for violation.

Under the new law, innkeepers and hotel operators will have to keep a registry of persons saying in their facilities for inspection by the immigration police. The law, as reported previously, fixes the income requirement for a pensionado at $1,000 a month and $2,500 a month for rentistas. And that amount covers close dependents. The final draft has ballooned by nearly 100 sections to 268 articles, The law has 28,263 words. What is not in the law is a topic that bothers many persons here living as so-called perpetual tourists. The amount of time a tourist must stay out of the country to legally renew a tourist visa is not addressed nor is the whole practice of multiple tourist visas.

The regulations that will be drafted to accompany the law may address this issue, but they have yet to be published. The law is clear, however, that every foreigner here must pay taxes. Few perpetual tourists do.

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You ALWAYS have an option ....... "NEXT" !!!

$40..4 day's on the beach..san juan-hammock"s..bus fare..$6...hookers and guara as well.... now that is expensive

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Jaco is called little USA by all ticos

If I was living in CR, I'd sure keep my assets liquid...and be looking hard at alternative countries.

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"A man accustomed to hear only the echo of his own sentiments, soon bars all the common avenues of delight, and has no part in the general gratification of mankind"--Dr. Johnson
"Amen, brother"-ED

Pay taxes on what?

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The Most Interesting Man in the World
"Stay thirsty my friends"

Unlike the United States CR does not tax worldwide income only income earned in CR.

Have seen or heard nothing about changing that. Perhaps Greengo might give us an update on what he is hearing.

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Pura Vida
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four
essential food groups:
alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
Alex Levine

Costa Rica's Tax Reform Saga Enters Second Act
by Mike Godfrey, Tax-News.com, Washington
16 August 2006

......Little detail is known of the new bill, introduced into the Legislative Assembly last week, but it seems that the new tax plan is a mixture of the old one, which includes reforms to the income tax system and a new system of value-added tax, and new proposals championed by the recently-elected President Oscar Arias designed to redistribute wealth from rich to poor through such mechanisms as a real estate tax on luxury properties and a 0.5% financial transactions tax.

A move towards a form of worldwide taxation system, whereby income earned abroad but brought into Costa Rica, is also included in the bill. Currently, Costa Rica taxes only income derived from within its borders.....

Discussed in 06 but not yet implemented (or legislated). I think it will be the way of the future. Harmful tax practises throughtout the world are being dealt with through the OECD.

Most countries are moving to an "internationally agreed tax standard" and ..On April 7, 2009, the OECD, announced that Costa Rica, Malaysia, the Philippines and Uruguay have been removed from the blacklist after they had made "a full commitment to exchange information" to the OECD standards. Costa Rica has commited to implement the standard.

FRom OECD website: 25 November 2009 – Costa Rica announced that it has signed a tax information exchange agreement with Argentina.....Costa Rica is a country committed to transparency and that is why this is the first of many conventions that we will sign in the coming months and for which we have already initiated contacts with countries such as Mexico, France, Holland, Switzerland, Germany, Brazil, Canada, Chile and Colombia, among others.”.....

Note the date of the article. That proposal died a quite death and has not been resurrected. The only portion that made it out alive was the "luxury home tax" that was recently enacted and caused some concern among expats. However even that is being shown to not be such a big deal. Far fewer properties then originally envisioned are proving to fall into the luxury tax category.

Seems to be the way of life in Costa Rica. A bill is introduced that seemingly is going to negatively effect the expat population. There is much angst and CR discussion groups are filled with declarations of "they are killing us gringos who are the golden goose in the economy", "I am selling out lock, stock and barrel and moving to ..(insert another country of choice here)", "they really hate and despise all gringos", etc, etc, etc. It has happened with the proposed tax reform, the new immigration proposals, the casino reform package and others. In the end nothing remotely resembling the original legislation is passed and gringos go back to living the way they are accustom to waiting for the next proposed law to get all upset about.

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Pura Vida
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four
essential food groups:
alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
Alex Levine

That $2500 a month for rentistas is going to certainly discourage a lot of people. It would certainly have excluded me if it had been the law when I got my residency. Using the common method of 'guaranteed income' of doing a CD deposit equal to 5 years income, that's $150,000. Certainly that's doable for some people, it wouldn't have been reasonable for me. We'll see how this all plays out. I suppose I should be glad, less competition from other gringos.

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"The only normal people are those you don't know very well." Joe Ancis

That is the rate you pay if you join through the ARCR group rate. To do that you have to pay $50.00 per year for membership which raises your true cost. By the way the CAJA only gets $30.00 of that $40 with the other $10. going to the ARCR.

If you join directly the rate is supposedly based on your income. I have heard the cost is 11% of your income. However, I since currently the minimum pension to qualify is $600. per month that would work out to $66.00. It would seem very simple for CAJA to know the immigration requirement but I know pensinodos paying much less a month.

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Pura Vida
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four
essential food groups:
alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
Alex Levine

CAJA has two base rates. Which one you fall under is based on your age. If you are young you pay a higher rate because besides medical you are paying into your pension fund. When you join the CAJA at an older age (read retired gringos) they do not require a contribution to the pension part as they figure your life expectancy is to short to worry about you contributing long enough to collect a pension.

Totally different then the SS in the U.S. where you could be a legal immigrant 85 years of age getting your first job. You would still have to pay FICA taxes even though your chance of attaining 40 quarters to make you eligible are slim.

Some things in the Tico system make sense.

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Pura Vida
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four
essential food groups:
alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
Alex Levine

That's real good news for me too, because I plan to do maybe 3-6 months in Belize, Asia, or other spot, 3-6 in Costa Rica, bouncing about a bit before (if at all) settling full time somewhere. If I can just make it to retirement age....

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The Most Interesting Man in the World
"Stay thirsty my friends"

These immigration laws are more bend towards improving the scope of employment in CR. This would provide a boost to the employment industry here to provide some better employment to the people here. Now, the good news comes with a little pressure so you have everything checked in advance to avoid being tricked by any trickster companies in the pretext of providing a lucrative job. Just be on your toes about all the matters until you have settled there with a job.

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compromise agreement

For what it's worth none of these laws are really being practiced yet and no one has a clear idea of what the heck is going on. I know of a few stories of issues at immigration lately with perpetual tourist visa use. It will take a while before one can get their $100 dollar new stamp. None of the "Gringo news sources" are reliable at all for legal things, the director of Migracion I think, forget the guys name, has conflicting stories in every one of them.

The latest interpretation of the $100.00 visa extension by the ARCR who keep up with these things is that it does not apply to "tourists" from the U.S. or Canada. Their reading of the regulation is that those who come from countries that are only given a 30 day tourist visa may apply for a 90 day extension. Those who come from countries that are granted a 90 visa are not eligible for an extension. Whether they are correct in that remains to be seen.

I do know of one case where a gringa applied for the extension. A couple of days later she was emailed that the extension was denied, no reason given, and told to make preperations to leave the country immediately.

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Pura Vida
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four
essential food groups:
alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
Alex Levine

To all who wish to explore Bell Curves, here's a link (WARNING: It gets deep):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_distribution

..."the PI" I acknowledge not understanding--Personal interregnum, Philippine Islands, passion interruptus, penis intercepted, persona incognito, playa imperceptible, privates investigator, plants impossible, plans improbable or what? I'm baffled.

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"A man accustomed to hear only the echo of his own sentiments, soon bars all the common avenues of delight, and has no part in the general gratification of mankind"--Dr. Johnson
"Amen, brother"-ED