VFS Global expects visa processing time to ease this year
Indians planning their summer travel to Europe may have to face lesser waiting period at visa centres this year as visa services provider VFS Global expects an improvement in visa processing time for foreign destinations on the back of deployment of additional staff by client governments to handle the visa applications traffic. "The Swiss have given us 25% more appointments. Also, earlier, their appointments would be concentrated in 2-3 months, now they have spread the appointments across the entire year.
Austria has indicated that it wants to increase appointments and have a quicker turnaround time," Vishal Jairath, head - South Asia, VFS Global told Mint. "The UK has priority service which is available to them. Canada is geared up.
For the US as well, we are seeing narrowing of gap between availability of appointments as earlier it was two years and now, it is 8-9 months and, in 2024 it will only improve further," Jairath said. A ban on international air travel for two years had put brakes on the visa business, resulting in shortage of staff when the restrictions were lifted in March 2022. This resulted in a massive backlog of visa applications with wait period surpassing even 1,000 days for a US visa application.
"In 2024, many of our client governments have confirmed to us that they have hired additional local staff or brought in expat staff. They are far better equipped. We can see that translating into higher percentage of appointments that they are making available or planning to make available in 2023," he added.
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