Key Personnel Work Permit: Scope, Documents, Application

A separate work permit regime is provided for foreign managers who will serve in foreign direct investments of special significance. We examine the concept of key personnel, the investment thresholds, the domestic and overseas application procedures, the documents required and the legal remedies to be pursued in the event of refusal.

One of the most frequently encountered needs in the structuring of foreign-capital companies in Türkiye is the employment of foreign personnel who will serve at management level. The legislation has regulated this need under a separate heading and has provided for a key personnel work permit regime for foreigners to be employed in particular positions within companies having legal personality.

What is decisive in this type of permit is not solely the foreigner’s position within the company; the company itself is also required to meet the investment criteria defined in the legislation. In other words, the examination is directed both at the individual and at the undertaking. Satisfying the conditions determined by the Ministry, submitting the required documents in full and making the application in due form are the three fundamental elements of obtaining the permit.

Below we address the scope of the concept of key personnel, the definition of a foreign direct investment of special significance and the monetary thresholds relating to it, the procedure for applications to be made from within and from outside the country, the documents required, the points to be observed in the employment contract, the extension procedure and the legal remedies available against a decision of refusal.

Who Is Key Personnel?

Key personnel means personnel who, in a company established in Türkiye and having legal personality, satisfy at least one of the conditions enumerated in the Regulation on the Employment of Foreign Nationals in Foreign Direct Investments.

Under the Regulation, the persons who may bear this designation are as follows:

Those serving in the senior management or in an executive position of the company
Those who manage the company as a whole or a particular part of it
Those who supervise or control the work of the company’s auditors or of its administrative or technical personnel
Those who undertake a function in, or hold authority over, at least one of the fields of recruiting new personnel to the company, terminating the employment of existing personnel, or making proposals on these matters; being persons in positions such as company shareholder, chairman of the board of directors, member of the board of directors, general manager, deputy general manager, company director, deputy company director and the like
Those possessing knowledge regarded as essential in terms of the company’s services, research equipment, techniques or management

The position is different for liaison offices: no more than one person, in whose name a certificate of authority has been issued by the parent company abroad, is accepted as key personnel.

What Is a Foreign Direct Investment of Special Significance?

This concept denotes a company or branch falling within the scope of the Foreign Direct Investment Act which satisfies at least one of the following conditions:

That the turnover of the company or branch for the last year stands at a level of at least TRY 576 million, provided that the total capital share of the foreign shareholders is at least TRY 667,882
That its exports for the last year reach an amount of at least USD 1 million, on condition that the total capital share of the foreign shareholders is at least TRY 667,882
That, while the total capital share of the foreign shareholders is at least TRY 667,882, at least 250 personnel registered with the Social Security Institution have been employed within the last year
That, where the company or branch is to make an investment, the envisaged minimum fixed investment amount is at least TRY 191.3 million
That the parent company has a foreign direct investment in at least one further country besides the country in which its headquarters is situated

The thresholds set out above relate to 2023; they are increased each year in line with the revaluation rate determined for that year.

How Is the Application Made?

A key personnel work permit is obtained by applying to the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, and the formalities are conducted through the e-permit system. The route the application will follow differs according to whether the personnel are within the country or abroad at the moment of application.

Applications Made from Abroad

Key personnel located abroad submit their work permit request to the mission of the Republic of Türkiye in the country of which they are nationals or in which they permanently reside. The mission sends the file directly to the Ministry, appending its own assessment of the application.

Correspondence between the missions and the Ministry is conducted by electronic mail. The documents requested at the time of application must be transmitted to the Ministry by the employer within 3 working days at the latest of the date on which the foreigner applied to the mission.

Applications Made from Within Türkiye

Foreigners lawfully present in Türkiye may address their key personnel work permit requests directly to the Ministry.

In both domestic and overseas applications, the transmission of the documents to the Ministry takes place through the e-labour automation system.

The Work Visa and Residence Permit Stage

Foreigners who obtain a key personnel work permit must apply for a work permit visa to Türkiye’s overseas missions within 90 days at the latest of the date on which they acquired the document.

After entry into Türkiye, a residence permit must be requested from the Ministry of Interior within 30 days at the latest.

Where key personnel — otherwise than under a student residence permit — have obtained a residence permit with a term of at least 6 months and are granted a work permit during the period of validity of that permit, there is no need additionally to obtain a work visa from the overseas missions.

Conclusion of Applications

Applications concerning key personnel to be employed in foreign direct investments of special significance and in liaison offices are decided within 15 days at the latest of the date of application, provided that the documents are complete.

Where documents are missing from the file, the applicant is informed and the 15-day assessment period begins to run on the date on which the missing documents reach the Ministry. In applications made from abroad, the period begins at the moment all the documents have reached the Ministry.

By way of exception, although an application may be made for foreign key personnel to be employed in a post in the field of vocational training within foreign direct investments of special significance, the Ministry is under no obligation to conclude such files within 15 days.

Documents Required for the Application

The documents that must be submitted for a key personnel work permit are as follows:

Information and documents establishing that the company or branch bears the character of a “foreign direct investment of special significance”
Information and documents showing that the foreign personnel are regarded as key personnel
Documents proving, in respect of liaison office activities, that foreign currency has been brought into the country from abroad within the last year
Foreign Personnel Notification Form
The foreigner’s letter of acceptance of employment or a certified copy thereof
Copy of the passport and its translation
Curriculum vitae form
Petition requesting the work permit

The documents must be scanned and sent through the e-labour automation system. In applications made from abroad, following the foreign personnel’s application to the overseas mission, the employer must transmit these documents to the Ministry through the e-permit automation system within 3 working days at the latest. The content of the groups of documents listed is detailed below.

Documents Proving the Character of the Investment

That the company or branch is a “foreign direct investment of special significance” is established by the following documents:

Documents showing that the total capital share of the foreign shareholders is at least TRY 667,882; a company-certified copy of the ledger entry, a company-certified balance sheet and a photocopy of the Turkish Trade Registry Gazette fall within this scope
A bank receipt relating to the export proceeds, a bank letter, a photocopy of the foreign currency purchase certificate or a company-certified income statement proving that the export figure for the last year stands at a level of at least USD 1 million
A company-certified income statement and similar documents showing that the turnover for the last year is at least TRY 576 million
In cases where at least 250 personnel registered with the Social Security Institution have been employed within the last year, documents of the nature of a Social Security Institution payroll proving this
Where an investment is to be made, an Investment Incentive Certificate or a Tourism Incentive Certificate establishing that the envisaged minimum fixed investment amount is at least TRY 191.3 million
A Certificate of Activity, an Activity Report or a letter to be issued by the official authorities of the country concerned showing that the parent company has a foreign direct investment in at least one country besides the country in which its headquarters is situated, together with a letter of assignment attesting that the key personnel to be employed have been assigned by the parent company abroad

Documents Showing Key Personnel Status

These documents vary according to which definition of key personnel the foreigner relies upon.

For persons working in the senior management or in an executive position of the company, those who manage the company in whole or in part, those who supervise and control the work of the auditors or of the administrative and technical personnel, and persons such as the company shareholder, chairman and member of the board of directors, general manager, deputy general manager, company director and deputy director who hold a function or authority in the fields of personnel recruitment, termination of employment or the making of proposals on these matters, documents of the nature of a photocopy of the Turkish Trade Registry Gazette and a photocopy of the resolution of the board of directors or of the general assembly of shareholders are required.

For persons possessing knowledge regarded as essential in terms of the company’s services, research equipment, techniques or management, a certificate of service and its translation, a copy of the diploma and its translation, and other documents relating to the field in which the personnel are to be employed, together with their translations, are requested. For example, for export staff, a bank receipt certified by the bank concerned showing exports on a country-by-country basis, a bank letter, a photocopy of the foreign currency purchase certificate or a company-certified income statement may be submitted within this scope.

Points to Be Observed in the Employment Contract

The first consideration as regards the employment contract is that the text should be drawn up in a manner consistent with the provisions of the Labour Act No. 4857 and the relevant legislation. In addition, the contract must not contain clauses conflicting with the provisions of the Foreign Direct Investment Act and of the Regulation on the Employment of Foreign Nationals in Foreign Direct Investments.

Another point decisive for the acceptance of the application is remuneration. The wage to be paid to the foreign personnel must be correctly determined in the contract; where an amount below the mandatory minimum wages envisaged in the Ministry’s assessment criteria is agreed, the application is refused.

The key personnel work permit process consists of mutually complementary stages: satisfying the criteria, obtaining the documents and completing the procedural formalities. Errors and omissions made at these stages or in the preparation of the employment contract lead either directly to refusal or to the unnecessary prolongation of the process. It is therefore appropriate for the process to be managed by a lawyer experienced in the field of immigration law.

Refusal, Objection and Action for Annulment

An application for a key personnel work permit may be refused where one or several of the permit conditions laid down in the legislation are not satisfied. The same result arises in cases where the procedural rules to be observed in the application have not been complied with.

Beyond these, a failure to satisfy the Ministry’s assessment criteria, a failure to possess the qualifications sought for key personnel, or a failure to fulfil the investment conditions envisaged in respect of foreign investments of special significance likewise constitute grounds of refusal.

In the event of refusal, those concerned may pursue the objection route or bring an action for annulment. The relationship between these two routes is one-directional: if an objection is made first, the period for bringing an action is suspended and, upon the rejection of the objection, an action may be brought; if, by contrast, an action for annulment has been brought directly, recourse to the objection route is no longer available.

An objection is made through the e-permit system, addressed to the Ministry, within 30 days of the notification of the decision of refusal to the foreigner. The letter of objection must be prepared within a legal framework, the information and documents supporting the grounds relied upon must be appended, and all the paperwork must be uploaded to the system in electronically signed form.

An action for annulment, on the other hand, is brought before the administrative court within 60 days of the day following the notification of the decision. The making of a prior objection suspends the period for bringing an action. For example, if an objection is made on the 25th day following the notification of the decision of refusal, 35 days remain in which to bring an action, running from the day following the notification of the decision given on the objection.

The note entitled “refusal of a work permit application”, in which all the grounds of refusal and the legal remedies that may be pursued against them are addressed in detail, offers a broad framework on the subject.

Re-application Following a Refusal

The refusal of an application is no obstacle to making a fresh request. However, before a new application is made, the deficiencies and errors that led to the refusal of the first file must have been remedied. The outcome of an application repeated with the same defects will not differ.

Extension Application and Refusal of Extension

A request for the extension of a key personnel work permit must be submitted within 15 days at the latest of the expiry of the permit period. An extension application may also be made before the permit period has come to an end; for this, one must be within a time frame of no more than 2 months counted backwards from the date on which the permit expires.

The documents required for an extension application are as follows:

In respect of liaison office activities, a document showing that at least USD 200,000 or the equivalent in foreign currency has been brought into the country from abroad within the last year
Foreign personnel notification form
Letter of acceptance of employment or a certified copy thereof
Copy of the passport and its translation
Petition requesting the work permit
The original of the previous work permit document

The application is made directly to the Ministry through the e-permit system by the foreign personnel or their employer, with these documents appended.

The refusal of extension requests may arise where the application conditions have not been complied with, and equally in cases where the Ministry’s assessment criteria have not been satisfied. A failure to transmit the documents to the Ministry fully and completely produces the same result.

Where an extension request is refused, those concerned may likewise object to that decision or bring an action for annulment. The procedure to be followed is the same as that explained above in respect of the refusal of an initial application.

More detailed information on the operation of the extension application and the documents required is set out in the note entitled “extension of a foreigner’s work permit”.

How Long Does an Application Take to Conclude?

Key personnel work permit applications made in due form are decided by the Ministry within 15 days at the latest.

Fees and Costs

The fees payable for a key personnel work permit are subject to a tariff that varies according to the term of the permit. In addition to those fees, a valuable paper charge of TRY 356 as at 2023 must also be paid.

Please note: The fee and the valuable paper charge must be paid within 30 days of the date of notification. If payment is not made within that period, the work permit application is struck out of process.

Independent Legal Assessment

The key personnel work permit is a matter that directly affects the management structure of foreign-capital companies in Türkiye. In practice, a considerable proportion of refusal decisions stem not from the qualifications of the foreigner but from the company’s inability to document the criteria for a “foreign direct investment of special significance”. It is therefore a sounder approach for the preparation of the file to be begun by the company rather than by the personnel.

The second breaking point of the process is the calendar. The 90 days for the work visa, the 30 days for the residence permit, the 30 days for payment of the fee and the periods envisaged for extension all run independently of one another; missing any one of them may render meaningless the fact that the other stages have been completed in due form.

In a specific file, the following headings should be addressed as a priority:

Determining at the outset which of the turnover, export, employment or fixed investment thresholds the company will rely upon
Clarifying which subparagraph of the definition of key personnel the foreigner falls within, and preparing the corresponding set of documents
Agreeing the wage in the employment contract in such a way as to satisfy the Ministry’s minimum wage criteria
Observing the limit of a single key person in applications conducted through a liaison office
Complying, in overseas applications, with the 3-working-day period for transmitting documents following the application to the mission
Making the choice, in the event of refusal, between objection and a direct action by calculating the suspensive effect on the periods

Independent Legal provides advisory services and conducts litigation in processes relating to the employment of personnel by foreign-capital companies, from the construction of the application file through to the conduct of the administrative objection and action for annulment stages against decisions of refusal.

Key Personnel Work Permit in Companies: Scope, Documents and Application Route