Nomadic Lives Local, Experiential India Travel Blog
The Application Process:
Step 1 – Online Application Form
The first step is to fill an online application form using the UK government website for visas and immigration in India here. You will be asked to create an account and fill a comprehensive online form. You can fill the form in installments, but remember to save often, because the website is rather unstable and also logs you out for inactivity after a certain duration.
Step 2 – Book an Appointment & Make Payment
Once you’ve completed all sections of the application form, all buttons on the panel on the left will turn green and you can submit your form – be sure to re-check though, since you cannot make edits post submission; you WILL be forced to repeat the whole process again.
Once you’ve submitted the form, you can make an appointment with a VFS centre of your choice to submit your supporting documents and biometric evidence (a fancier word for recording your finger-prints, retina scans and ugly-looking photographs, that make you wonder if you’re a criminal-in-disguise). Once you book an appointment slot, you will in most cases be required to make an online payment for your processing fee – please ensure you are in a position to make the payment within 3 hours of booking an appointment, failing which your appointment will be automatically cancelled.
Booking.com
Despite the Visa frustrations, your upcoming travels sound great! Can’t wait to hear more!
I thank my lucky stars I have a Canadian passport- I saved about 2 hours in the line at JFK because of that!
Enjoy your trip!
Hi Sanket, Is it necessary to subit documents related to scotland travel when u r applyin for UK visa? I have applied for UK visa, but going to scotland is still not sure.. what should I do…If I have written Scotland in my VISA application but I have not submitted any travel or hotel bills of scotland , then will it still get accepted?
Thanks
Aditya
Hi Aditya,
Thanks for stopping by. To be honest, the UK embassy doesn’t give clear instructions on what documents to submit. You don’t necessarily have to mention you are traveling to Scotland. Here’s what is necessary: you need to prove that if you are in the UK for 20 days, you have enough funds for your sustenance for 20 days. I’d say return flight tickets are an absolute must, because then they know you have a strong motivator to return. After that, you may or may not make confirmed accommodation bookings. The thing with this is – if you make and show accommodation bookings, then your bookings need to match up with the itinerary you are sharing. If not, then you can get away with not showing accommodation bookings but having access to enough funds to be able to book on the go. I’d recommend that you build a simple itinerary to attach with your application, and make fully-refundable bookings that match. Try using Booking.com – you will find many options that are 100% refundable. If you have other questions, feel free to email me.
Also, this article is from some time ago. Please be careful to review current policies on the UK immigration office website.