Overstaying Schengen visa (with no travel planned outside of Spain)?

[Bay23]

Hello all,

I know this is probably a frequent question on here, but I have some twists and turns to my situation. I have a student visa that covers me and my 6 year old daughter, and I am supposed to move to BCN in late August to start my PhD fieldwork. My retired parents had planned to move there with us for the school year (9 months) to provide childcare, and I (foolishly) told them they wouldn't need visas/wouldn't be able to get them. I'd been told that they could just leave every 90 days and do a weekend trip to Morocco or Paris and then come back in and get passports re-stamped with a new 90-day Schengen visa. (When I was last in BCN, that's what everyone told me is done when people don't have long-term visas.) For my part, I've entered Spain more than once in less than 6 months, with no visa.

But now I'm hearing that people are getting detained and deported for overstaying the 90-day Shchengen tourist visa?! All the tales I've heard about it are situations where people left and tried to come back in without waiting the 90 days (180 days?) in-between entries.

Does anyone know if it's fairly safe to just stay within Spain and overstay a 90-day Schengen visa, as long as you don't try to leave and re-enter?

(And if so, are there any situations within the country where we'd need to avoid them showing their passports - ayuntamiento? etc.?)

The only alternative to them just coming on the 90-day and deliberately overstaying it, that I can see, is for them to enroll in a language school and try to get student visas in time? The retiree and residency-without-work-permit visas both take way too long for them to get them in time to be in BCN with us when I have to start my research...

Any realistic advice very much appreciated!
Thanks,
B.

[baldilocks]

If caught overstaying ANY visa (either when you leave or get stopped or your passport has to be produced, you are likely to be banned from re-entry (this could be for a very long time, maybe life and may affect ALL Schengen countries) so tread carefully. The current economic situation in Spain means that the authorities are perhaps more strict than they used to be.

[Bay23]

Originally Posted by baldilocks

If caught overstaying ANY visa (either when you leave or get stopped or your passport has to be produced, you are likely to be banned from re-entry (this could be for a very long time, maybe life and may affect ALL Schengen countries) so tread carefully. The current economic situation in Spain means that the authorities are perhaps more strict than they used to be.

Okay, thank you. My parents are just coming to do childcare so I can do my PhD research (would be near-impossible to do alone as a single mom without them). I don't think they have any reason to re-enter the Schengen zone in the future, so being banned from re-entry wouldn't be a big deal. Being jailed would be.

[mrypg9]

There were many cases in the Czech Republic of people (mainly Americans) being stopped for document inspection....then arrested and deported if the person had overstayed.

I can't say whether the same would happen in Spain.

[baldilocks]

Originally Posted by Bay23

Okay, thank you. My parents are just coming to do childcare so I can do my PhD research (would be near-impossible to do alone as a single mom without them). I don't think they have any reason to re-enter the Schengen zone in the future, so being banned from re-entry wouldn't be a big deal. Being jailed would be.

They aren't so harsh as to jail unless there is also some criminal activity but they may deport. They may even get away with it under extenuating circumstances, but may not.

[JulyB]

I would think it would be pretty unlikely that they would be stopped, especially in BCN where they are so accustomed to tourists. I would think carefully about the worry that the possibility of deportation might cause to your parents, though, and make sure that they honestly feel happy about the situation. It's a tough one.