No stamp on visa?

Hey guys,

My wife recently got her X visa and we picked it up from the outsourcing agent of the consulate in Hamburg yesterday. On all her old visas there used to be a stamp from the consulate in the little white square on the sticker. This time there is no stamp on it.

We asked the person at the outsourcing center if the stamp was needed and he said that since the visas are electronic, this stamp is not required anymore.

Can anyone else who has received a visa recently please confirm that theirs came without it as well? Otherwise I am thinking of calling the consulate to check up.

Thanks,
Anuj

It turns out there are some reports of this appearing online now [1][2][3][4].

That said, there is no authoritative source publishing any information about this. So I have dropped an email to the Consulate in Hamburg and will post back whatever I hear back from them. Hopefully, they reply soon.

In the meantime anyone having received such a visa, please post here and also provide details of your travel experience.

I dont know about Indian visas(I am an Indian citizen) but none of the visas I have recieved in the last 5 yrs had a stamp.
they are digitally printed stickers(with my pic and all other info) which is pasted on my passport.

No stamps.

Most countries are moving to machine-readable travel document(s) which are more secure.

Hi there,

my visa in 2010 had a stamp, the one i got today not. I hope it will be valid.

Bye
dhobi wallah

Yes, I know this. I have had lots of visas over 10 years and most of them have just been digital stickers. Except the few that were purely just stamps. But the Indian visas I have seen for many years have carried a stamp and signature on them.

Agreed. Definitely more secure. In fact, the Indian visa that was issued to my wife in January this year was for the first time (in our experience) also a digital machine readable one, with a picture on it. But it still had a stamp and signature.

There is no place on the visa sticker that writes place of issue and my guess is that this is why each consulate stamped it. The visa from this time, has a blank space for a stamp, but it is just that - blank and glaring.


Thanks for this confirmation! It is good to know that at least one more person has this type of visa. When do you plan to travel? Could you please provide an update on what your experiences with the airline and immigration are?

I got a new visa issued on the 1st of this month - new format - colourful - with my photo - and white square on right side - on which there's a circular stamp saying Embassy of India and then the name of the city.

Did you get the visa in Germany?

Bump. Any new updates?

Hi sehgalanuj,

sorry, i have been offline for a while.
I will travel early November.
If they don't let my in, I will give a posting here afterwards, but I hope, I do not have to do so.

Good luck!
-dw-

Thanks for the update dw. But we are also traveling early November. I am thinking of writing a registered letter to the consulate to try and get a response from them. I will let you know what happen.

Anuj

Bump? I have not received any update from the consulate so far. Today a friend had a visa issued that had a stamp and signature, both on it. Now I am confused what is actually going on. Anyone here that has any new info?

Anuj

I live in the US, but when I got mine they said they are starting to eliminate the stamps. I know a few areas here have done so already.

Thanks for the update Dawna! I also got an update from the consulate today saying that the visa, without stamp and signature, is valid. I will update this thread with our travel experience, once we are in India in 2 weeks.

I just got my passport and my wife from the Indian embassy in Mexico City (we are mexicans) and her visa is stamped on the white right square with a red stamp saying something about Indian Embassy Mexico City, but mine is NOT stamped! so I was wondering if I should send my passport back for stamping or just go on like this... I am really concerned because if both were stamped or not stamped would seem more normal than one with and one without.