Latest Consular News
Application Fees for Non-Immigrant Visas to Increase on January 1, 2008
December 14, 2007
Effective January 1, 2008, the U.S. Department of State will increase its Machine-Readable-Visa (MRV) application fee from USD $100 to USD $131 around the world. The increase allows the Department of State to recover the costs of security and other enhancements to the non-immigrant visa application process. Applicants in Guyana will continue to pay their fees at the Demerara Bank in either Georgetown or Berbice, and will still use the electronic visa application form (EVAF) when applying for their non-immigrant visas.
Applicants who have paid the prior US$100 application fee before January 1, 2008, AND appear for a visa interview before January 31, 2008, will be processed without having to pay the $31 difference.
Applicants who paid the prior US$100 application fee and appear for visa interviews AFTER January 31, 2008 must pay the difference of US$31 at the U.S. Embassy before they will be interviewed.
Any application fee payment submitted after January 1, 2008, regardless of the interview date, must be for the full US$131.
The Department of State is required by law to recover the cost of processing non-immigrant visa applications through the collection of the Machine-Readable Visa application fee. Because of new security-related costs, new information technology systems, and inflation, the monies collected worldwide through the $100 Machine-Readable Visa fee no longer cover the actual cost of processing all non-immigrant visa applications. This is the first increase in the Machine-Readable Visa fee since 2002.