Conversion of residence permit from waiting citizenship in work

The Decree n. 394/1999 from the President of the Italian Republic establishes in article 11, paragraph 1, letter c) that "A residency permit (permesso di soggiorno) is issued, when the conditions are met, for the reasons and duration indicated in the entry visa or in the consolidated immigration laws, which are acquisition of citizenship or status of stateless person, for a foreign citizen already in possession of a residence permit for other reasons, for the duration of the acquisition or recognition procedures".

A foreign citizen who is already in possession of another permesso di soggiorno for other reasons can therefore request the issuance of a permesso for the acquisition of citizenship, which will last until the conclusion of the naturalization procedure. This is to compensate for a possible expiration of another permesso that might already be in their possession for other reasons.

The residence permit for awaiting of citizenship recognition cannot be requested by those who have already submitted an application for recognition of Italian citizenship at an Italian consulate in their country of origin.

Until recently, a person holding a permesso for awaiting citizenship could not use that permesso to work, and could not request the conversion of such permesso for awaiting citizenship into a work permesso.

The conversion into a permesso for subordinate work was allowed only to holders of a permesso for self-employment or for family reasons.

Recently the situation has changed because the Law Decree 21 of October, n. 130 (published in the Official Gazette no.261 of 21 October 2020) which became effective on 22 October 2020, added to article 6 of the Consolidated Immigration Text (Legislative Decree no. 286/1998) paragraph 1-bis) which, among the various changes, provides the possibility of converting the permesso for the acquisition of citizenship into a permesso for work reasons, if the requirements are met.