You've found the right candidate overseas and someone mentions they'll need "a work visa for Ireland". Then someone else says they need "a work permit". Same thing? No — and mixing them up is one of the most common reasons a first overseas hire stalls.
The short answer
They are two separate permissions from two separate government departments.
The employment permit is permission to work in Ireland. It is issued by the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment (DETE), it is tied to the job you are offering, and the application is built around your business: your company details, the role, the salary, and in most cases a labour market needs test you run first.
The work visa — properly the long stay (D) employment visa — is permission to travel to Ireland. It is issued by Immigration Service Delivery (ISD), which sits under the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration. Your worker applies for it in their home country, and only after the permit has been approved.
One line to remember: you arrange the permit; your worker then gets the visa — with your permit as the key document. If the candidate is from a visa-required country such as the Philippines, both steps happen every time. Neither replaces the other.
The employment permit: your side
The permit is the employer's half of the process, and it comes first. For most roles CA Recruitment places — healthcare assistants, experienced chefs, dairy and pig farm workers, construction craft trades, HGV drivers — the route is the General Employment Permit, with the Critical Skills Employment Permit covering higher-paid shortage occupations like nurses and engineers.
The permit application names your company and the specific job. DETE checks the role is eligible, the salary meets the required threshold, and — for a General Employment Permit — that you advertised the role first under the labour market needs test. We've covered the mechanics in our step-by-step permit application guide, so the point here is simpler: this document is what everything else hangs off. No permit, no visa application.
A granted permit on its own does not get your worker into Ireland. That's the visa's job.
The work visa: your worker's side
Once the permit is approved, a visa-required worker applies for a long stay (D) employment visa. This is a personal application — made by the worker, in their own name, from their home country or wherever they legally reside. ISD's process has three steps:
- Apply online through AVATS, the Irish visa application system. This can be done up to 3 months before the planned travel date.
- Pay the visa fee — €60 for a single-entry visa, €100 for multiple entry. The fee is not refunded if the application is refused.
- Submit the supporting documents to the designated visa office or embassy within 30 days of creating the online application. Originals are required, and anything not in English or Irish needs a certified translation.
Look at what those supporting documents include and you'll see why employers can't treat the visa as "the worker's problem": the employment permit itself, the contract of employment, and a letter from the employer in Ireland — all on top of the worker's passport, photographs, medical or travel insurance, evidence of qualifications and finances. Half the visa file comes from your side of the process.
ISD advises that applicants can expect a decision within approximately 8 weeks of the visa office receiving the application. It can be faster, and it can be slower — processing varies by country and by season, and missing documents restart the clock.
One more thing worth knowing: an approved visa lets your worker travel to Ireland, but entry is confirmed by the immigration officer at the border. Workers should carry copies of their permit, contract and visa documents when they fly.
Who needs a visa (and who doesn't)
Whether the visa step exists at all depends on the worker's nationality. Ireland keeps a list of visa-required countries, and ISD publishes a nationality check you can run in seconds.
The Philippines is visa-required. So a Filipino care assistant, chef or farm worker always makes the full two-step journey: permit, then visa. The same applies to workers from India, Pakistan, Nigeria and most other major non-EU recruitment markets.
Some nationalities — the US among them — are not visa-required. A worker from those countries can board a flight to Ireland without an entry visa. What trips employers up is assuming that means no paperwork: a non-visa-required worker still needs the employment permit before they can legally work, and still registers with immigration after arrival. The exemption removes one step, not the process.
(UK and EEA citizens are the genuine exception — they don't need an employment permit at all. Everyone else does.)
The sequence: permit first, then visa
ISD puts the order in one sentence: "Once your permission has been granted and if you are visa required, you must apply for a long stay visa (D) before traveling to Ireland." In practice, a Filipino hire runs like this:
- You make the job offer and sign a contract of employment.
- Labour market needs test (for a General Employment Permit): you advertise the role as DETE requires.
- Employment permit application to DETE — prepared and submitted with your company details and the signed contract. Then it sits in the DETE processing queue; current waiting times are in our processing times tracker.
- Permit granted. Now — and only now — the visa step opens.
- Your worker applies through AVATS for the long stay (D) employment visa and submits the document file, including the permit, contract and your employer letter.
- Visa decision — plan around the approximately 8-week guideline.
- Travel and border entry, permit and documents in hand.
Add those stages together and you'll see why we tell employers the honest number: roughly six months from starting the process to the worker's first day for a General Employment Permit hire — the permit queue, the visa weeks, then flights and notice periods. An agency quoting you "a few weeks" is quoting one link in the chain, not the chain.
Who arranges what
The division of labour is clean once you see it:
The employer (or CA on your behalf) handles: the job offer and contract, the labour market needs test, the DETE permit application and fee, the employer letter for the visa file, and keeping every document consistent across both applications — the same job title, salary and hours everywhere.
The worker handles: the AVATS visa application in their own name, their passport and photographs, medical or travel insurance, evidence of qualifications, and attending any biometrics appointment their local visa office requires.
That last point about consistency matters more than it looks. The visa officer reads the permit, the contract and the employer letter side by side. A salary that differs between documents, or a job title that changed along the way, invites questions — and questions add weeks.
This split is also where hires fall apart when nobody owns the whole chain. The permit is granted, everyone celebrates, and then the visa file goes in late, incomplete, or with a Yahoo-address employer letter that ISD won't accept (their document rules are strict: original headed paper, landline number, signed by hand). When CA Recruitment manages a placement, we run the permit end-to-end and walk the worker through the visa file step by step, because our placement isn't done until the person is at work — not when the permit PDF arrives.
After arrival: registration and the IRP card
There is a third piece of paperwork employers hear about and worry they've missed: registration. After arrival, your worker must register their immigration permission with ISD within 90 days of it being granted. They attend an appointment, pay a €300 registration fee, and receive an Irish Residence Permit (IRP) card by post — the physical proof they are legally in the State. Employment permit holders register on Stamp 1, the immigration stamp that corresponds to working under a permit.
Nothing here needs to frighten you: it's an appointment and a fee, not another application that can be refused like the permit or visa. But it belongs in your onboarding plan — a new arrival juggling a new job, housing and a bank account can let the 90 days drift without a nudge.
The costs at a glance
For a typical General Employment Permit hire from the Philippines:
- Employment permit fee (DETE): €1,000 for a permit of up to 24 months, paid with the application — refunded at 90% if the application is refused.
- Entry visa fee (ISD): €60 single entry (€100 multiple entry), paid by the worker with the AVATS application. Not refundable.
- Registration fee (ISD): €300, paid at registration after arrival.
By law the employment permit fee sits with the application and cannot be recouped from the worker's wages, and reputable practice keeps it with the employer. The visa and registration fees are personal to the worker — though some employers choose to reimburse them as part of the relocation package, which goes a long way for the price of a night out.
Two departments, one process — if someone runs it
The permit-versus-visa confusion exists because two departments each own half of the same journey and neither's website describes the other's half well. DETE tells you about permits. ISD tells you about visas. Nobody hands you the combined checklist — which is exactly what your worker's start date depends on.
That's the gap CA Recruitment closes. We manage the DETE permit application from labour market needs test to approval, then guide your worker through the AVATS visa file with documents that match the permit line for line, and we don't consider the job done until they've landed, registered and started work. Our 90-day guarantee covers the two situations most likely to go wrong early — the worker leaving, or a dismissal for gross misconduct — and it applies to CA's recruitment fee only, not the government permit fee, visa or travel costs.
If you're weighing up an overseas hire and want the two-step process handled as one, message us on WhatsApp — tell us the role and the nationality of the candidate (or let us find you one), and we'll map the permit and visa timeline for your specific case before you commit to anything.
Frequently asked questions
Is a work permit the same as a work visa in Ireland?
No. The employment permit is permission to work, issued by the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment. The visa is permission to travel to Ireland, issued by Immigration Service Delivery under the Department of Justice. A worker from a visa-required country such as the Philippines needs both, in that order: permit first, then visa.
Does the employer apply for the worker's visa?
No. The visa application is made by the worker, in their own country, through the AVATS online system. The employer's job is the employment permit, plus supplying documents the visa application needs — the contract of employment and a letter confirming the job. A good recruitment partner coordinates both sides so neither step stalls.
How long does an Irish employment visa take after the permit is approved?
Immigration Service Delivery advises that applicants can expect a decision within approximately 8 weeks of the visa office receiving the application, though it varies by country and time of year. That is why we tell employers to plan on roughly six months from starting the permit process to the worker's first day, not the permit processing time alone.
Do Filipino workers need a visa for Ireland?
Yes. The Philippines is on Ireland's visa-required list, so a Filipino worker needs a long stay (D) employment visa before travelling — even with an approved employment permit in hand. The permit is one of the core documents submitted with the visa application.
What happens if my worker is from a country that doesn't need a visa?
They still need the employment permit — the visa exemption only covers travel to Ireland. A non-visa-required national can board a flight without an entry visa, but they cannot legally work without the permit, and they must still register with immigration within 90 days of being granted permission and get their Irish Residence Permit card.