The Schengen visa is a single visa which allows you to access the Schengen Zone of 26 countries in Europe. If you had to travel to member countries such as Austria, Germany or Italy, ideally, you’d have to apply for this visa a good 15-30 days before departing from India. Not the ideal time frame if you had to rush for an important business meeting or an emergency.
As per a recent Times of India report, the Schengen States may soon start issuing fast-tracked visas to accommodate last minute travels. This would cut down the decision time for travellers who need a priority Schengen visa from India. France, for example, has already brought down the processing time to 48 hours.
The UK already has a similar program, for over a year, where one can apply for a Super Priority or a Priority visa. Super Priority cuts down the decision window to just 24 hours, while Priority takes a week, as compared to the 3 weeks on the normal process. And they don’t come cheap. Expect to pay anywhere from INR 20,000 to INR 90,000 for these visas. The Schengen priority visa is also expected to cost a pretty penny. At the moment, no Schengen Zone member has announced a priority visa yet.
Priority Processing of the Schengen Visa should come in handy for folks who have to make last minute trips to the region. The obvious target market which comes to my mind are the people who travel for work. But with more and more Indians heading to Europe to study or work, I think a broad segment of travellers may benefit from this option. [Ed’s Note: Why don’t these people have a long-term multi-entry circulation visa anyway?]
Bottomline
15 days is a long time in today’s times. With the pace of business getting faster than ever, you never know when you’d be needing to travel at a moment’s notice. This priority visa, when it arrives, is going to be a welcome step towards enabling such kinds of travel schedules.
Have you ever had a reason to pay the European visa guys a visit to get a quick Visa issued? What is the price you are willing to pay for this service?
This would be good for countries like Portugal which take ages to process the visa. My 1 month visa took over a month to get processed. But maybe because it was a month-long visa that is why. Dunno. Germany had earlier processed in 3 days.
Mint money however you can. Priority Visa. Next will be get Priority First on Priority by paying extra extra.
I don’t know if it’s possible to get a long term multiple entry Schengen visa without demonstrating a need. E.g. It took several trips to one EU country in a couple of years before they agreed to give me a multiple entry visa, that too valid for one year.
Although commendable, these “premium” services are a joke and just another garb of charging more money IMHO.
The UK is a prime example of that! One of the most horrendous and least user-friendly experiences. France has actually shown that processing/decision times CAN realistically be reduced and I have had excellent experiences with applying to The Netherlands as well.
And, I do realise that the Indian side also does not have a stellar record of giving visas at their missions across the world BUT the charges for us in India are just mind-numbing. Specially if it is NOT a work trip and you have to foot the bill yourself.
The schengen visa in itself is quite non-standard! The member states issue visas with a validity whose formula seems to elude me. What was quite insane was that I’ve just been granted a Schengen visa valid for 5 Yrs by the Netherlands when Spain gave me a ridiculously short one earlier this year despite the nature of my work/travel !!!
In the end I do think this EXPRESS service will definitely benefit only a certain spectrum of individuals. This only gets a half-hearted commendable from me at least I think it would be more beneficial to standardise the Schengen visa process.
Cheers!