Type A residence card renewal timeline

Hello Josh. Actually they take time to assess your study progress, they will evaluate if you have passed enough credits or not, then they will approve or refuse your residence permit application. The time limit for examining of your application is not well defined, it varies. So you need to wait untill they give their decision

@ABS25 Thanks a lot for the reply!

I am a postdoctoral researcher with a convention d'accueil. Perhaps the credit and study progress may not apply in my case.

@Josh Jasper Is it your first residence card renewal?

@ABS25  Indeed! It is my first resident card renewal.

@Josh Jasper Then i think there is no big worry. They might be just re checking everything. Also This delay is may be due to huge work load. Just wait, no other option

Keep following up by email and in person with your commune/Gemeente.

Your renewal might already be there and they overlooked/forgot to notify you.

It happens more often than you might think.

Thanks, @ABS25! The only worry is that I am kind of bound to Belgium's boundaries, and in case of emergencies, I won't be able to travel even to my home country.

@Edigj, Thanks! I had a few email exchanges with the commune. They also mentioned that it has been being processed for the last three months. They mentioned that they sent a reminder recently.

@Josh Jasper It might not be related to this case, but I had to follow up a lot with my commune for the renewal of dependent visa for my wife. The person who was communicating with us kept asking us to wait. We wanted to travel to India as we had booked tickets a long time ago. So we communicated the emergency and they followed up with the ministry and the permit was renewed within a day. So try going to the commune and making your point. This might help you get it sooner. This is just an opinion, might work, might not!

If the person at the commune is nice enough he/she might simply call the ministry and get the answer in the spot. It happened to me a while ago.

Thanks, @arjunprasad2143 and @Edigj!

I have been regularly checking with the commune. However, the answer so far is the same. Given the Christmas & New year holidays approaching, I am worried whether the process gets further delayed. Perhaps, as @Edigj is suggesting, I can go to the commune in-person and ask them about the status.

I managed to have a call with the immigration department. Since I applied for prolongation with my wife (who came here on a family-reunion visa), they mentioned that my file is treated under article 10, which can take up to 9 months. Is it the case always?

At least it sounded a bit strange to me!! (This implies that every year I have to apply for the prolongation and wait for nine months 🤷)

I remember for my wife renewal process too around 3-4 months. You probably just need to wait.

@Josh Jasper I too in the same boat,applied in Aug,in Oct 27,got to know that few documents were missing, though i have provided them,but still i gave again,my file has been sent to Brussels again in November 9,still waiting...everyweek i follow up in Brussels  and today I called once again,they told me to wait till January...I have booked my tickets in dec for India,unfortunately i have to reschedule my tickets..its really very frustrating...I have been waiting long....

@hssn601 Thanks! It looks like there is no other way!!

@Urvashi Ghosh Indeed! It is frustrating! It's a pity you can not even return to your home country! I thought they might be able to give some documents allowing us to do that.

I don't know whether your case is the same; I don't even have any document proving that I have requested a residence permit extension (the only evidence is the email exchanges with the commune).

To update the community! I finally got approval from immigration today. However, the commune mentioned that it is not so common for a renewal process to take this long if I have a convention d'accueil. So my case might be an outlier (but from the responses here, it sounds the opposite 😐).

@Josh Jasper may i know under which commune you are associated with?

@Urvashi Ghosh I am with the Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve commune. 

To update the community! I finally got approval from immigration today. However, the commune mentioned that it is not so common for a renewal process to take this long if I have a convention d'accueil. So my case might be an outlier (but from the responses here, it sounds the opposite 😐).
-@Josh Jasper

Not actually, my friend is also a researcher and its very often that he got a delay from the commune for extension. The last extension spent him about a year but when it was approved than he almost reached the expiration (because it was extended till a specific date per work contract). Then he started another procedure just weeks after the extension of the previous one . Sounds funny but yes, everything is possible in Belgium . You might heard a story that if you come to the commune for 3 times, ask  3 different staffs about one procedure, its very normal if you will get 3 different answers/instructions for the same procedure