Visa online proves popular
Murmansk, St. Petersburg and Baku launched the “Visa online” on January 19th. More than 50 percent of the visa applicants to Norway have now got the opportunity to submit their applications online.
Kiev, Moscow and London introduced the visa solution some months ago, and the experiences so far prove the online service to be very popular.
– Visa online is a very convenient and up to date service for the visa applicants. We are proud to offer this service to a significant number of the visa applicants to Norway. The results are no more long queues in front of the Foreign Service Missions, faster case handling time and reduced workload for the employees at the Missions, says Jonas Gahr Støre, the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
– I am very satisfied with the fact that Visa on-line has been launched at some of the most important Foreign Service Missions for visa applicants. More than 50 per cent can now apply on the Internet, and thus get a much better service. I hope we will be able to offer this service to as many applicants as possible. In the future, we will also offer online solutions for other types of applications, says Ida Børresen, the Director of the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (UDI).
Online help
The applicants can receive online help to complete their application forms correctly. They can later check up on the status of their application by logging on to the portal. In addition, it is possible to receive text messages to their mobile or e-mail, when the status of their application changes in the course of the case processing period.
The Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (UDI) is now developing the Visa online website to handle applications for residence permit. These new services will be offered by next year.
Efficiency
When a visa application is registered on the Internet, it saves the Foreign Service Mission for a lot of time. Problems related to misspellings of names will vanish, as this often is a result of illegible handwriting. Experience shows that between four and ten minutes is saved per application. This will amount to many hours for the larger Foreign Missions.
As a general rule, an applicant is to meet at the embassy to hand in a visa application. This often leads to long queues, but Visa online also provides a booking system which allows the applicant to book an appointment to submit all required documents. This greatly improve the service to the applicants, who then can just turn up at the appointed time and go straight to the counter, rather than wait in a long queue. This also gives the embassy a better opportunity to plan and organise their workday.
Very popular
Visa online also provides functions for registering groups of applicants. This has been developed with travel agencies in mind, who then can register the applications themselves.
One person can also register on behalf of others, for instant members of the family or colleagues going to Norway. The visa fee is paid online via a secure payment service provider.
The service is simple to use. The numbers from November show that the applicants prefer to apply online. In London 96 per cent used the service, in Kiev 64 percent and in Moscow 40 per cent after a few months of use.
Opening up for online applications for work and residence permits constitute an important part of the Immigration administration’s greater commitment to the use of information technology (the EFFEKT-program). The main goals of this program are enhancing services to users and the efficiency of the Immigration administration.
Norwegian Directorate of Immigration
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