If I divorce but remarry before the expert of my spouse visa can I use the same visa?

8 comments

1. I’m guessing that since your spouse visa is specific to your spouse you would need to get a new spouse visa. I’m not sure a new spouse can take over sponsorship of a spouse visa from a previous spouse.

2. I don’t know if it’s a good look either or to the immigration office

3. I believe you can. BUT you have to follow the process correctly, like you would when changing a job on a work visa I.e notify immigration within 14 days of the divorce… ideally right away.

   After divorce then you’re no longer engaging in your SOR which is to be a spouse. But assuming you follow the process correctly (notifying immigration) you get a 6 month window to sort a new SOR. But if you remarry then you just continue to engage in your current SOR. Just like you would with a getting a new job on a work visa. The only time you need to get a new visa with a new job is if you’re changing SOR for that job.

   I.e the SOR (in this case spouse visa) is tied to the holder engaging in the duties of the SOR (in this case being married in a functional marriage). It’s not tied to an entity (in this case a Japanese national). It just seems it is because you can only be married to one person at a time.

   (The only visa tied to an entity is the HSP visa, which is tied to employer)

   However, If you don’t notify immigration of the divorce within 14 days or your ex husband notifies immigration of the divorce before you do then you’re going most likely going to be screwed l.

   Also obviously your PR clock resets so you can’t apply for PR until after 3 years of marriage to the new Japanese citizens.

   And as your link points out you will likely get a lot of scrutiny come renew time, so you’ll probably be stuck on 1 year spouse visas for a long time anyway. Meaning you can’t apply for PR until you have a 3/5 year visa.

   You can see Q99 here that there seems to be a framework in place for divorce and remarriage on the same spouse visa: https://www.isa.go.jp/en/publications/materials/newimmiact_4_q-and-a_page3.html#q99-a

   “*Q99: In the event that a foreign national who is residing in Japan as the spouse of a Japanese national gets divorced and does not submit a notification to the Commissioner of the Immigration Services Agency, but then gets married to another Japanese national, and this information becomes clear during the application for extension of period of stay, will the application be rejected?*

   *A. Should such an event occur, a ruling will be made after taking the individual circumstances related to the lack of a notification concerning the divorce into consideration.
   That being said, those who fail to notify the Commissioner of the Immigration Services Agency of their divorce may be subject to a 200,000 yen fine, in accordance with Article 71-5, Item 3 of the Immigration Control Act.*”

   ((keep in mind this is about people who don’t notify immigration of divorce. Meaning that assuming you submit the notification of divorce and legally remarry within the 6 month grace period, the. It should be possible to just Continue in your current spouse visa)

4. You need to apply for a new spouse visa. Complete with the long questionnaire paper and the photos proving your relationship and everything again as if you were applying from the beginning. Because it’s a whole new relationship and new marriage that they need to screen and check out if it’s a fake marriage or if you have enough money to support yourselves, etc. your original status of residence was approved based on your ex husband and your relationship, you need to get approval again based on the new relationship. You fill out the “renewal” application form though since technically you are renewing the same status.

   When you divorce you need to inform immigration within two weeks (do it immediately if you are already late) and they can begin to revoke your visa after 6 months of divorce so that’s why you can’t just wait until your current one expires (unless it expires in less than 6 months, or near 6 months) even if you have 2.5 years left on your visa they will be able to revoke it after 6 months.

   I have firsthand experience with this

5. I’m not sure how well this will turn out. Unless immigration believes you fell in love with someone new in a couple days, it looks like you either were 1) previously living in a spouse visa while knowing the marriage is over, or 2) marrying prematurely to get a new spouse status.

6. They very much look into the relationship before granting a spouse visa to avoid people with fake marriage getting one and my first thought is, new guy new visa.

7. I guess getting married over and over again would level up your spouse game, so sure it makes you an expert.

8. Call immigration anonymously (different phone number if needed) and pitch it to them? See what they say.