Posted on 22/05/2009 4:10 pm

Re: Stuck between Auslaenderbehoerd and Arbeitsagentur

Regarding unemployment benefits there is an unfortunate catch 22 situation:

The catch 22 starts with loosing one´s job. Here one should take neither a dismissal or a contractual time limit in the job contract simply lying down especially if the latter has thus far been prolonged for a couple of times.


Though having lost one´s job after having contributed for at least 12 months to the fund, the Employment Agency (AA) still does not regard you as being “arbeitslos” as defined by the law - and thus eligible for payments - as long as the residence permit restricts you to a single employer.

This restriction is to be seen in the context of the procedure involved in getting a residence permit for gainful employment. Usually the AA has to give its permission before the AB (Foreigner´s Authority) is allowed to issue a residence permit for gainful employment. After two years of employment such a permission by the AA is no longer required and only discretionary. At the same time the former restrictions, e.g to a specific employer, no longer apply.

The third point to take into consideration is that the law actually expressly stipulates that a residence permit for gainful employment shall only be issued if a specific job offer is at hand.

This latter point has to be carefully taken into account in devising a strategy when dealing with the AB to resolve the issue.


Rechtsanwalt_Jain@yahoo.de