One Application, Two Governments: a Region Decides the Work and the Federal Minister Decides the Stay
Answer
The general rule applies to you
No exception is recorded for citizens of Chile on this topic. That is the answer, not a gap - everything below is the rule you get, unchanged.
116 exceptions recorded across 45 countries · none match Chile to Belgium · Residency through work
Belgium's single permit is not one decision taken by one authority. Chapter VIIbis of the Act of 15 December 1980 says the application for a work authorisation is made to the competent regional authority, and that making it counts as making an application to stay. The federal minister then decides the residence side, within four months of being told the file is complete, and if he does not decide in time the applicant is authorised to stay. The sting is in the next provision: that residence authorisation is valid only on condition that the regional authority takes a final decision authorising the work. A reader who learns what Belgium requires has learned half of it, and the other half is written by a region this record does not reach.
At a glance
- Where the application goes
- To the competent regional authority, not to the federal government
Article 61/25-1, first paragraph, of the Act of 15 December 1980.
- What that application also is
- An application to stay
Article 61/25-1 says lodging the work application amounts to lodging the residence application.
- Who decides the stay
- The federal minister or his delegate
Article 61/25-2, § 1er.
- Deadline on the federal decision
- Four months from notice that the file is complete
Article 61/25-5, § 2, first paragraph. It may be extended in exceptional circumstances linked to the complexity of the examination.
- If that deadline passes
- The applicant is authorised to stay
Article 61/25-5, § 2, third paragraph. Silence grants rather than refuses.
- What the residence authorisation still depends on
- A final regional decision authorising the work
Article 61/25-2, § 3, second paragraph, which makes the federal authorisation conditional on the regional one.
- Renewal
- Lodged at the latest two months before the previous authorisation expires
Article 61/25-3, first paragraph.
- Sickness insurance
- Required, covering all risks in Belgium for the applicant and the family
Article 61/25-2, § 1er, second paragraph, 6°.
Requirements
- An application for a work authorisation, lodged with the competent regional authority
- A valid passport or equivalent travel document
- Proof of sufficient means, the duration of the employment and, where applicable, the employer's VAT number
- A police record extract and a medical certificate, except on renewal
- Sickness insurance covering all risks in Belgium for the applicant and the family
Country-level policy
Part of what this site records about Belgium is decided by a government the federal statute book does not speak for. The Act of 15 December 1980 says a third-country national applies for a work authorisation to the competent regional authority, that the application counts as a residence application too, and that the residence authorisation the federal minister grants is valid only on condition that the regional authority finally authorises the work. The split is visible in the texts themselves and not only in their references. The Act of 19 February 1965 on self-employment, once one federal statute, is now printed by the official database several times over - a federal article, then a Flemish one, a Walloon one, one for the German-speaking Community and, for some articles, one for Brussels-Capital - and the header carries two repeal notes: it has been repealed for the Flemish Region since 1 January 2022 and for Brussels-Capital since 1 October 2024. The royal decree on driving licences and the road traffic Act of 1968 are printed the same way, with regional variants of article after article. A reader who stops at the federal answer has part of one, and which part depends on where in Belgium they mean to live.
What applies to you
Nothing changes for a citizen of Chile
We have no rule recorded that treats your citizenship differently here, so the general rule above is the one that applies to you. That is an answer, not a gap.
What the law says
«Les dispositions du présent chapitre s'appliquent aux ressortissants de pays tiers qui introduisent une demande d'autorisation de travail, ou de renouvellement de cette autorisation, dans le Royaume auprès de \[3 l'autorité régionale compétente\]3, \[2 à l'exception des ressortissants de pays tiers qui sont soumis aux \[3 dispositions du chapitre VIII, du chapitre VIIIbis et du chapitre VIIIter\]3\]2 L'introduction de cette demande vaut introduction d'une demande de séjour.»The hinge of the whole regime. The work application is lodged with the region and is simultaneously the residence application. The bracketed numerals are Justel's own marks: they enclose words inserted by a later Act, and the Act is identified in the footnotes under the article.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
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«Le ministre ou son délégué statue sur la demande de séjour visée à l'article 61/25-1.»The federal half of the decision.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«6° la preuve qu'il dispose d'une assurance maladie couvrant l'ensemble des risques en Belgique pour lui-même et les membres de sa famille.»Health cover is a condition of the permit, which is why the healthcare record and this one point at each other.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«Conformément à l'article 17, alinéa 3, de l'accord de coopération du 2 février 2018, lorsque le ressortissant d'un pays tiers est autorisé à séjourner en application des dispositions du présent chapitre, l'autorisation de séjour n'est valable que sous la condition que \[2 l'autorité régionale compétente\]2 prenne une décision définitive autorisant le ressortissant d'un pays tiers à travailler sur le territoire du Royaume.»The condition that makes the federal authorisation depend on the regional one. The bracketed numerals are Justel's own marks: they enclose words inserted by a later Act, and the Act is identified in the footnotes under the article.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«2° en cas d'absence d'un contrat de travail en cours de validité, le ressortissant d'un pays tiers dispose des moyens de subsistance suffisants pour la durée du séjour envisagé»Means are asked for only where there is no valid employment contract, which is the opposite way round from most of this corpus.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«Conformément à l'article 25, §§ 1er, 3 et 4 de l'accord de coopération du 2 février 2018, le ministre ou son délégué statue sur la demande de séjour, ou de son renouvellement, dans les quatre mois suivant la notification du caractère complet de la demande.»Four months, and the Act ties the deadline to the cooperation agreement of 2 February 2018 rather than setting it alone.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«Si le ministre ou son délégué ne statue pas dans le délai visé à l'alinéa 1er, éventuellement prolongé, le ressortissant d'un pays tiers est autorisé au séjour.»What happens on silence.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«la demande de renouvellement introduite sur la base de l'article 61/25-1, alinéa 1er, et répondant aux conditions déterminées par \[2 l'autorité régionale compétente\]2 est introduite au plus tard deux mois avant l'expiration de la validité de l'autorisation précédente.»Renewal, and again the regional authority sets the conditions. The bracketed numerals are Justel's own marks: they enclose words inserted by a later Act, and the Act is identified in the footnotes under the article.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
Practical notes
The Blue Card, seasonal work and intra-corporate transfers have chapters of their own and are excluded from this one by article 61/25-1. Each of them repeats the same federal-regional split in its own words.
What the region asks for - the labour market test, the salary floor, the shortage lists - is regional law, and no regional instrument was read for this record.
The Act repeatedly cites an accord de coopération du 2 février 2018 between the federal state and the regions. That agreement is the plumbing of the single permit and it was not read here.
- consolidatesLoi du 15 décembre 1980 sur les étrangers, consolidated text
Justel, Service public fédéral Justice (Moniteur belge) · consolidated to 2026-06-24
About this source
Belgium's consolidated federal legislation, served from the Moniteur belge site at two stable address forms: an ELI of the shape /eli/<type>/<yyyy>/<mm>/<dd>/<numac>/justel, and the older /cgi_loi/change_lg.pl query carrying the dossier number. Each record prints the date the consolidation is updated to, lists its archived versions, and marks in the body which amending Act inserted which words, with the Act identified in footnotes under the article.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The site is behind a web application firewall. A direct request from this project is answered with a JavaScript challenge page and a support ID, never the document, and the Bright Data proxy is refused at the CONNECT stage; only the extraction service returns text, and even then it refused two records outright - the French text of the Wetboek van economisch recht and the Code des impôts sur les revenus by its dossier number - while serving the Dutch and ELI forms of the same instruments. It may not be cited for the income tax code at all: the record for the Code des impôts sur les revenus 1992 states that updating was suspended in 2002, shows the text as at 9 April 2010, and carries no text of the Code. Dutch and French are both authentic and a Justel record serves one of them; a quotation from one says nothing about the wording of the other. Several instruments are printed as parallel regional versions of the same article - federal, Flemish, Walloon, Brussels, German-speaking Community - so an article number alone does not identify a text. The consolidations are unofficial: the Moniteur belge as published governs. Nothing regional is here: decrees and ordinances of the Regions and Communities, which decide work authorisations and self-employment, are published elsewhere.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source