What kind of work can I do as a Spanish student visa holder?

By
Bruno Bianchi
-

Question

I am a student studying a masters here in Spain and I just picked up my new TIE. To my surprise it says that I am authorized to work whereas my old one does not. I applied for the same Spanish student visa. Does anyone know of the law has changed or what kind of work I can do ? Initially I am thinking it is a mistake

Answers

These are the answers of some Facebook group members:

“Yes the law has recently changed to where you can work as long as your job is linked to what you are studying .”

“There is no requirement that the job is linked to what you are studying. Consider what that would mean for someone studying medicine.”

“Yes, the law changed on July 27th last year. Now students can work up to 30 hours directly.”

“I just got my new NIE. And mine says not allowed to work but even with this my second year in Madrid I worked at an academy which is when we could only work 20 hours. And BEDA told us we can work up to 30 hours now. But never mentioned anything about our NIE having to say “allowed to work”. I’m more confused now lol”

“It does NOT need to be in a related field. You also don’t have to work 30 hours. You can work 5 if you want.”

“Before you still needed to apply for a work permit to be able to work part time as a student, now you don’t have to do it anymore.”

“You only don’t need to apply for work permission if you’re studying a certain type of higher education course. For everyone else, you still need to apply for authorization to work (but yes, you can now work 30 hours if you get that authorization).”

“I think this is only for student visa holders who are doing their studies. I have an aux friend and her card would still say ‘No Autoriza a Trabajar’ on the back part. There are lucky ones who are auxes who got the ‘Autoriza a Trabajar’ on the front part. As usual it would again depend on who is printing your card. It could be that some aux positions are tied to postgraduate studies.”

“For the PhD studies (investigacion) I see now they permit to work”

“Yes, the REGULATION recently allowed student stayers studying university degrees to work. Feel free to look for employment. Ask for maximum wage.”

“For the most part the Auxiliares are excluded from this. I got my TIE in September and it said I was not allowed to work.”

“Use it wisely to get a job and change it next year to a real residence permit. After the changes of August 2022 students can change to a residence permit after the first year. To change your student visa to a residence permit you either need A) a work contract for an unlimited period by the time that your permit expires (but it’s difficult to get if you don’t have a work permit), or B) you apply as a freelancer (autónomo) and you need a business plan that has to be approved by a Spanish instution and then you apply for residence, again by the time that your permit expires.”

“The 30 hours work permission is only automatic for certain types of studies (mainly masters programs), and therefore would not apply to auxiliaries, although they can request the permission (same as in the past).
Being able to modify from a student visa to a work permit before 3 years does seem to apply to anyone on a student visa (including auxiliares), as long as they completed the program that they got the student visa for. I’m assuming this based on the current requirements for the modificacion listed here: https://extranjeros.inclusion.gob.es/es/InformacionInteres/InformacionProcedimientos/Ciudadanosnocomunitarios/hoja065/index.html?“

Related article: “How the Spanish student visa is affected by the new immigration law regulation in 2022“

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