Applying for an Indian Visa in the UK: Your Questions and Experiences

Good luck, tell us how you get on

Unfortunately I mean going to London to give them my passport and forms etc. I wish I meant going going. As soon as that's in the passport the show is on the road!

Also, I am new to India Mike and just want to say you're a friendly bunch aren't ya!

Any input regarding your application is appreciated. Cheers.....

Just to update you all, and out of general interest.

I went to the London office tomorrow, the one on Goswell Road. I turned up 15 mins before my appointment time was meant to be, but it turns out I had failed to print out my appointment form, so they just gave me a waiting slip anyway.

I was slightly annoyed at myself, but nobody in the queue before or after me had an appointment anyway so I don't think it really makes any difference. The actual process was incredibly painless and easy.. I waited for about an hour (I expected longer), and the actual visa submission was about 5 minutes.

Now, I haven't got my passport back yet (!) but I would say it's a positive start so far!

I meant yesterday, not tomorrow. I am not yet a traveller of both time and space.

Oh, and one more thing- I paid online and that's another positive in my experiences, I would recommend it as it generally speeds everything up once you get there.

In Hindi (and possibly other Indian languages too), the words for yesterday and tomorrow are the same - kal

So your mix-up wouldn't have been a mistake at all!

Hi guys I'm new to this site, having just stumbled across it in the last few days.

I wanted to share my first visa application experience;

I handed in my completed form on Wednesday 16th and collected my passport today.

1. Completed form online. Noticed a couple of typos (not anywhere important). Did not upload photos or make online payment.
2. Booked appointment at London centre for Wed 16th.
3. Arrived at centre 30 minutes early. Given a ticket.
4. Photos: Took photos in the onsite booth- costs £8 (in £1 or £2 denominations). Note to those of us slightly vain: the pictures from that machine are far from flattering. And the visa along with the photos becomes a permanent fixture on a passport page.
5. My ticket number was called at the time of my appointment.
6. < 5mins - forms accepted, payment accepted, receipt given. Advised earliest collection would be Friday. Longest could be infinite.
7. Same evening received text and email stating application had been dispatched to high commission.
8. Received text today at 3.30 stating passport ready for collection.
9. Raced to centre. No queue. Collected immediately using receipt.

Very, very happy!! Ecstatic, actually!

Hope this helps!

Thanks for the update JJ, great news that you got your visa so quickly.

How much did you pay for your visa?

That is THE question...

It doesn't really matter now does it. the new fees are now in force.....

didn't even know about the fees going up on Thursday.
purely by chance went to the VFS Birmingham office to hand my application in on Wednesday-it was packed.
queued for one and a half hours outside to get inside the door to get my queing number to hand my application in.
got this at 11.45 and it said there were 133 people in front of me.
i finally submitted my application at 5.15pm and there must have been over 100 people still waiting!!
now just waiting for passport to be returned in the post-expecting a slightly longer processing time than normal due to the volume of applications they were processing-they said it was 5 times busier than normal!!

Jonesyjones,
Well done, easy isn't it? How the hell have the rest of us managed to create a thread 6596 posts long. Hmmmmmm!

Probably like everything else we do.....

Jump straight in without reading the instructions, however hard they may seem.

Many of us us on here repeat the same old stuff continually, but don't like to see people struggling unnecessarily.

...and one thing (possibly the only thing) that's guaranteed about Indian bureaucracy is that IT IS NOT CONSISTENT.

There are no guaranteed magic formulas for success, but reading recent reports of successful applications is always useful.

I found this thread invaluable when I was doing all this for the first time, and was trying to get my head around it all. Thanks to everyone who has contributed!

Hi,

My apologies if this kind of query has already been answered - there are just so many pages on this thread I haven't been able to look through them all.

I was just wanting some advice about my visa application. I applied at the London Victoria centre on January 4th, stupidly I didn't read the info on forums like this before and put down my profession as working for a charity. They therefore got back in touch asking for a letter from my employer which I provided (this took two goes as well because I didn't address it to the Indian High Commission correctly).

So basically the most recent letter was sent from VFS to the High Commission on 14th January. I had a missed call from the High Commission themselves on the 15th as I was in a meeting at work. They also spoke to a family member at home and they told her that they would try and call me back later.

A week has now passed and they still haven't called me back "later". The VFS are ignoring my emails and not picking up the telephone. I've tried to ring the High Commission visa complaints line but nobody has answered that either. I'm getting really worried - not flying til the 7th of February but there is obviously a further problem with my application and I would really like to know what it is so that I can get it sorted.

I just wondered if anyone had any advice about whether it is possible to get in contact with the High Commission, or to try and make VFS find out what is going on?