Applying for an employment permit for persons with tolerated status
Source: BUS Rheinland-PfalzIf you are a tolerated resident in Germany, you are only permitted to work if this is expressly stated in your toleration permit (certificate of suspension of deportation). If you wish to work, you must therefore apply for an employment permit from the Foreigners' Registration Office. This also applies to vocational training or an internship.
You can be granted an employment permit if you have been permitted, tolerated or have been granted permission to stay in Germany for three months and you have found an employer who would like to take you on.
Tolerated persons who are obliged to live in a reception facility only have access to the labor market after six months.
In order to process your application, the Foreigners' Registration Office usually involves the Federal Employment Agency, which examines the working conditions. After more than four years of uninterrupted residence in Germany, the Federal Employment Agency no longer needs to be involved.
If you would like to complete company-based vocational training (dual training), the employment permit for the specific training position must be applied for individually. Vocational training at school is not subject to approval.
The employment permit will be issued for the maximum duration of your current tolerated stay permit. If the requirements are met, this can be extended accordingly when the tolerated stay is renewed.
The pursuit of gainful employment is generally prohibited if
- You have come to Germany to obtain benefits under the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act,
- your residence cannot be terminated for reasons for which you are responsible or you have violated your duty to cooperate in removing the obstacle to deportation (e.g. insufficient cooperation in obtaining a passport or proof of identity, deception about your identity or nationality),
- the tolerated stay was issued with the addition "tolerated stay for persons with unclear identity", or
you are from a so-called "safe country of origin", i.e. a member state of the European Union, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ghana, Kosovo, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (North Macedonia), Montenegro, Senegal or Serbia and have submitted an application for asylum after August 31, 2015, which was rejected or withdrawn, unless the withdrawal was based on a consultation with the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees. Even without an asylum application, persons from safe countries of origin cannot receive an employment permit.