two words that i have heard students use to be absent from class:

                Family illness

the school is hardly going to send a representative over to your home country to verify if your parent is going into hospital/needing surgery/dying.

Until you step off the plane and hand over your passport to the PSB for the RP, you still have an out.

Then just don't respond to their emails/phone calls etc.

I have not had to do this, but it was always my back-up plan if the school were really ****ing me over, but i do know some FT's who did. EDIT: I do know an FT, who when he said he had to return home to attend a family funeral, he was asked for a copy of the death certificate. When he returned, he was super angry with the school for the rest of the semester. Especially as they wanted him to make up the time.

Yep Sorell makes a good point; none of these things are enforceable. I'd be surprised they even went to the effort to cancel your z visa. The owner of a school I spoke to said it was such a hassle to cancel a visa he would only do it if somebody had really pissed him off.

Wait you're not even in the country yet. Ah that makes it trickier. You might want to apply for another job and they haven't cancelled your visa. How can you apply for another job? Hmmm I'm not sure maybe somebody else can answer. Like Sorrel says I would just say somebody in your family got ill and you cannot leave for China. maybe there is someway you can find out if they have canceled your visa. If they haven't you could work somewhere in shanghai. If they have you can start the process again i think.

The contract will not be binding in your own country

schools in shanghai are expensive to set up and usually follow visa regulations correctly. most are part of big branches.

Yes, I was worried about this. If I cancel my contract and they have already applied and received a visa invitation however I have not received it and do not yet have my Z work Visa. Will this cause problems if I try and apply for another school in Shanghai? What about if I try and apply for a school in a different province? 

Contracts in China aren't worth a cracker.  How do I know this?  My employer, with whom I have just signed another contract, told me so in exactly those terms only two days ago.

Just say you showed the contract to a legal friend.

Then ask questions.

Is this contract legal under Chinese law? My friend says no.

I dont like this part, can I change it?

Do you apply the 5 year law? What is the 5 year law.

This contract is in English. Is it legal?

Trust me on this. Chinese employment law is fuzzy. No one understands it. Start quizzing them, and they will decide you are more trouble than they are worth.

And do it all via email. Your webcam is broken. No more skype.

If they get nasty, no problem. Are you using a gmail account? Ask them how they can do that when it is bannned.

Do they have a license to employ foreigners, or a buisiness license? Ask for a copy so you can scan the matrix code ( wechat has a handy scanner where it will tell you all public domain info attached to a business license, including deposited capital).

If you keep asking questions, they will soon forget you exist.

But anyway, come to Guangzhou, its much better than Shanghai.

Thank you for all of your answers. I have one last thing to bring up. I read this on usembassy-china.org. 

"- Early Termination

Contracts should always include an acceptable early termination clause.  If a contract is terminated early and the employee wants to work at another school in China, a “Letter of Release” from the previous school will be required.  This letter allows the next school to officially register the teacher; without it one cannot work legally at a new institution. "

I understand that this contract is not legally binding in any way , but should I be asking for a Letter of Release or does this not matter? Thank you for your continued help and support. 

I have decided to go along with the cancelation of this contract. I thank you all for your help. On a side note, due to my lack of experience (recent college graduate, age 23, no formal teaching experience, but I do have a TEFL) I have decided life may be more enjoyable and easier to get in a 2nd tier city. Has anyone here taught in one and can provide me with any recommendations? I have heard that Wuxi, Nanjing, or Suzhou are good cities for foreigners. Any comments? 

If School's name you wrote is "Kiddie English', school is most likely unauthorized to hire FT, or such School can't apply for Working permit and Invitation letter, both documents needed for Z visa application.

If School is unauthorized to hire FT, Contract you signed is invalid, or in other words it doesn't carry any obligations. You don't owe School anything, if you don't respect the Contract, and sign new Contract with legally authorized school for FT hire.

Its difficult to write right advice without seeing 'Working permit', you received from the School.

You can give us a snap shot of the WP you received, just blank out your name.

WP is A3 format paper with text in Chinese characters. On the bottom of the WP is Chinese red stamp, some 4 cm in diameter. That's how real WP looks like, and it must be original, not copy/scan version.

When School mails WP, it always comes together with Invitation letter.

You could also dial SAFEA in your working city (Shanghai), and inquire about the School with them. 

Enter 'SAFEA' in search above for address and contact nos. in your city.

read a contract b4 u sign it contract lesson 101

There's a couple of things you've forgotten.

Firstly - if you choose not to come here, what are they going to do??? Chase after you? At worst, as you might be fearing, they might tell a few people in other schools here you're not a good choice for employment. however, given the number of schools and all in Shanghai, that's not really likely to happen!

is the PSB or other relevant authority that does visas going to care... nope! They see thousands of such applications.. why should they give a damn because one of them gets cancelled? After all, there's nothing that's really going to happen if an application is made, and then not followed through on.

And, lastly, remember that all contracts have a probation period anyway... so you could legitimately jump ship (or get fired) with no repercussions! In fact, it's been one way some devious places have gotten out of their legally binding penalty clauses! (well, saying it - not that they actually meant anything!)

Mmm dont take the job, telththem you cant come and find something else that you have peace about. I didnt have peace about my job and now im stuck with it!

I may have to break my contract this summer, but I will know if I have to BEFORE I start working there, as some personal and professional things have changed, but the school will have already got a new work visa for me, so what kind of trouble will I be in?I repeat, by the time I know if I will have to break the contract the school will have already gotten me a new work visa but I won't have actually worked for them yet.

I know this one trick used to work for South Korea, because there wasnt a central database to track foreign teachers. Simply tell them some BS story like sorrel said, AND get a NEW PASSPORT issued to yourself. This rids your current passport of the visa, so any new potential employer wont see the old visa and say "whats this ?" If the potential new employer sees the visa, and does an inquiry...they could track the visa back and talk with them. Since Chinese almost always side with Chinese, new employers will blackball you in all probability. LASTLY, I DONT KNOW IF THIS WILL WORK FOR CHINA.