Iceland skilled worker visa (expert knowledge permit)

The Directorate of Labour may relax the conditions for an expert or manager permanently employed at the employer’s establishment abroad who is sent temporarily to its Icelandic establishment; this is Iceland’s intra-company route. It may also grant permits for specialised jobs temporarily lacking in Iceland that are listed in a regulation. University staff and researchers coming under a service or collaboration agreement use a separate permit that cannot lead to permanent residence.

The Directorate of Labour (Vinnumálastofnun) grants the permit when the employer has sought its help to find someone in Iceland, the EEA, EFTA or the Faroe Islands; you have a contract for a specific job that requires expertise under Icelandic law or practice; your expertise is essential to the company; and it rests on university-level education or industrial, artistic or technical training recognised in Iceland. The Directorate may ask for certified diplomas and for a competent body to confirm the level the job needs.

Regulated professions need recognition first: industrial trades through ENIC/NARIC and the District Commissioner of East Iceland, health professions through the Directorate of Health.

If you do not yet hold an Icelandic residence permit, the employer is responsible for the work permit. It submits the work permit application together with your residence permit application on form D-107, signed by both of you, to the Directorate of Immigration; the Directorate of Labour then decides on the work permit. One fee of ISK 80,000 is paid by bank transfer before filing, and the paper file goes to Dalvegur 18, Kópavogur.

Expert applicants may be in Iceland while the file is processed, but only during a legal stay: on a valid visa, or within 90 days in 180 if visa-free. If that time runs out, the application is refused unless compelling reasons of fairness apply.

When the Directorate approves the application, it asks the relevant embassy to issue an entry visa (D visa), normally the mission responsible for your place of residence. Within 90 days of the grant you must attend a photo appointment at the Directorate of Immigration in Kópavogur or a District Commissioner’s office, submit a notification of residence, and, if you come from a country on the Directorate of Health list, have a medical examination within two weeks of arrival. Miss any of these and the permit is not issued.

Once these steps are done the residence card is ordered; you are emailed and can collect it five days later where your photo was taken. The Directorate asks Registers Iceland to record your legal domicile, which gives you an Icelandic ID number (kennitala).

Renew online before the permit expires; if you stay with the same employer and applied in time, you may keep working while the renewal is processed. The employer must have paid withholding tax and social security contributions, and the Directorate of Labour may ask how your expertise has been used. A new employer means a new work permit and a fresh assessment of whether you count as an expert in the new job.

If the job ends, notify the Directorate of Immigration at work@utl.is. A permit revoked for that reason can be replaced by a one-year permit to look for another expert job.

The permit gives the right to family reunification for a marital spouse, a cohabiting partner after at least a year together, children under 18 in your custody and parents aged 67 or over. Spouses and children under 18 of expert permit holders are exempt from the work permit requirement. After four years on this permit, with no more than 90 days abroad in any year, you can apply for permanent residence.

A refusal is a written decision that can be appealed to the Immigration and Asylum Appeals Board (Kærunefnd útlendingamála) within 15 days of receiving it. An appeal does not normally suspend the decision unless you ask for suspension; refused applicants who are in Iceland are usually given about 30 days to leave. If you miss the deadline, the refusal becomes final.