THE UNITED States Embassy in Kingston has announced an increase in the non-immigrant (visitor) visa application fee.
Effective Friday, November 1, 2002, the new cost will be US$100.
"This worldwide increase is necessary to meet the administrative costs of processing non-immigrant visa applications, which were not fully met by the previous fee increase in June of this year," a news release from the US Embassy said. (Then the fee rose from US$45 to US$65.)
"This previous fee increase was implemented to cover costs at an estimated visa application level of 10.5 million per year. However, the number of non-immigrant visa applications has dropped by almost one third since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States."
The embassy said there had been no corresponding decline in the costs of running non-immigrant visa operations, because the processing of each application was more time-consuming and labour-intensive as a result of enhanced security screening requirements instituted since September 11.
These new security procedures require each American embassy or consulate to collect more information on each person applying for a US visa and carry out additional name-checks within US government, law enforcement, and intelligence-gathering agencies.
Furthermore, the embassy said, changes in the role of support staff and increased management oversight in the visa process had contributed to greater administrative costs.
The fee adjustment that will take place on November 1, 2002 is expected to cover the cost of providing additional non-immigrant visa services at the current levels of demand for US visas around the world, the embassy said.
