Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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106. To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality the status of a type D visa application by a person (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31613/16]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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I am advised by the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service (INIS) of my Department that the visa application referred to was created on-line on 19 August, 2016. The application was submitted to the Irish Embassy in Ljubljana on 29 August, 2016 and then forwarded to the Visa Office in Dublin where it was received on 13 September, 2016.

In accordance with the Policy Document on Non-EEA Family Reunification, published by my Department in December, 2013, the Visa Office aims to process applications of this type within 6 months of receipt by the Visa Office. It is therefore expected that this application will be decided in March, 2017. This time-frame is purely a business target and is subject to the receipt of all required documentation as set out in the Policy Document. While the Visa Office endeavours to have applications of this nature processed earlier than this target, this is not always possible. As you will appreciate, in order to be fair to all applicants, applications are processed in order by date received. Both the applicant and the sponsor will be informed as soon as a decision is made.

The Deputy may wish to note that queries in relation to the status of individual immigration cases may be made directly to INIS by e-mail using the Oireachtas Mail facility which has been specifically established for this purpose. This service enables up to date information on such cases to be obtained without the need to seek information by way of the Parliamentary Questions process. The Deputy may consider using the e-mail service except in cases where the response from INIS is, in the Deputy's view, inadequate or too long awaited.

In addition, applicants may themselves e-mail queries directly to the Visa Office (visamail@justice.ie).