The Albanian seasonal single permit for the tourism season
Article 58 of Albanian law no. 79/2021 caps the seasonal single permit at six months a calendar year and requires a six month break before a return.
The seasonal single permit is granted for up to six months in any calendar year and is tied to one region, one employer, one occupation and one fixed term contract. The rule sits in article 58 of law no. 79/2021 on foreigners, as amended by law no. 43/2025.
Those six months are not extendable. They are the ceiling of the category, and a hotel that opens in April and closes in October has seven months of trading against six months of permit. That mismatch is the first operational decision of the season, not an administrative detail.
What separates the seasonal permit from the employee permit
Both require approval from the National Employment and Skills Agency under article 74, point 5, but the conditions that follow diverge sharply.
| Element | Seasonal single permit | Single permit as an employee |
|---|---|---|
| Duration | Up to 6 months per calendar year, article 58, point 2 | Length of the contract or job offer, article 57, point 3 |
| Return to the same employer | Requires a 6 month break, article 58, point 4 | No break required |
| Tie to the post | Fixed region, employer, occupation and contract | The employer named in the permit |
| Family reunification | Not available, article 41, point 8 | Available under article 41, point 1 |
| After the contract ends | Return to the country of origin, article 58, point 5 | Renewal under article 33 |
Point 6 of article 58 takes the article out of play for Schengen area nationals and for cases governed by a special regime under an international agreement. For workers from Nepal, India or the Philippines, the corridors that supply Albanian tourism, article 58 applies in full.
Point 3 adds a condition that seasonal recruitment often overlooks: if the contract states that the activity is a regulated profession, the foreign worker must meet the recognition conditions under national law. A cook is unaffected; an electrician on hotel maintenance frequently is not.
The real calendar of a season
The statutory deadlines are read backwards from the opening date. Article 56, point 4, gives the authority four weeks from the filing date to examine the request and issue the single permit once the criteria are met. Ahead of that sits the publication phase: article 74, point 9, requires the vacancy to stay public for no fewer than five calendar days, and point 11 requires the posting to have been made no later than 90 days before the approval request.
Since August 2026, when the joint instruction of the minister responsible for the economy and innovation and the minister responsible for internal affairs cut the AKPA response from ten working days to one working day, the longest stretch is no longer the approval. It is the type D visa at the mission of origin and the collection of the biometric card, about fourteen days after the decision.
For a season starting on 1 May, the file has to be complete in early March and the vacancy posting has to be no older than early February to stay inside the 90 day window. Employers who start in April do not lose administrative weeks; they lose the first month of the season.
The six month break and next year's team
Point 4 of article 58 is the limit that bites hardest on multi year planning. After the first year of work the employer may file again for the same foreign worker on condition that the break is six months. A waiter working from May to October can come back the following season, because winter covers the break, but the same person cannot move straight into a mountain winter season after a coastal one.
The practical consequence is that a seasonal team is not a stable team. Employers who want continuity in key posts, such as head chef or maintenance supervisor, move those to the employee single permit of article 57, which is granted for the length of the contract, and keep the seasonal permit for high turnover positions. The cost split between the two schemes is worked out in cost and timeline for hiring a foreign worker.
Monthly cost does not change with the type of permit. The national minimum wage is 50,000 lekë gross per month from 1 January 2026 and serves as the minimum contribution base, on which the employer pays 16.7 percent. Over a six month season that is roughly 50,000 lekë of employer contributions per worker on minimum pay, before accommodation if it was declared on the job offer.
Regional seasonal schemes differ in structure; the comparison with the Greek bilateral quota is in bilateral quotas and seasonal work, while the shared steps of the file are in the Albanian single permit procedure. How Werklist plans a season with employers is set out on the employers page.
The Albanian season is rarely lost for want of candidates. It is lost to two weeks of delay in posting the vacancy, which push the whole chain past the opening date.
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