Getting into the spirit of the upcoming G-20 summit, Korean government is making changes to improve the lives of foreign residents in Korea.  

Last month, the office of Prime Minister (a position appointed by the president in Korea) announced regulation changes for foreigners in Korea.  These new rule changes affect many foreigners residing in Korea and I've summarized some of the major changes that are likely to affect you below.

Improvements to the Visa and Status Change Processes

1. E-2 Visa holder's allowed period of stay will be set to end one month after the end date of the employment contract

This rule change seeks to eliminate the inconvenience for E-2 visa holders who come to Korea earlier than the start date of their contract experiencing the expiration of their allowed stay before the end of their contract.

2. Less documents to submit for E-2 visa holders when changing employers

If you're already in Korea working with an E-2 visa, you will no longer be required to submit your criminal record document, college diploma and transcript to apply for the change of employers.  

3. Lessened requirement on Korean Proficiency Requirement when obtaining F-5 status

If you've lived in Korea for longer than 5 years, the Korean language requirements will be lessened.  For those who have lived in Korea for more than 10 years, an interview will replace the Korean language proficiency requirement.

Also being implemented are small changes to help foreigners in everyday lives such as:

- Free provisioning of alien registration number verification system to smaller Korean websites to facilitate foreigners usage of the Internet in Korea.
- Allowing subscription to all cable companies by foreigners. (before, some small cable companies did not allow foreigners to subscribe)
- Lengthening of name field on paper-based government forms to allow for longer names to properly be filled in.
- Eliminate repeated fingerprint collection during questioning process by the police.

These changes are said to be the result of about 100 foreigners proposing changes to improve the lives of foreigners living in Korea.

Some of these changes are going to be in place right away and some by the beginning of 2011.

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