Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Solidarity)
Link to this: Individually | In context

1624. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality to report on the typical waiting times for the granting of a short term stay visa for South African citizens; if he will outline the reasons for the length of the processing times; the measures he intends to take to improve processing times; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20579/25]

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context

I can advise the Deputy on 10 July 2024 visa requirements were introduced for nationals of South Africa.

The Dublin Visa Office have established a dedicated “South Africa desk” to process applications from residents of South Africa. My Department also established Visa Application Centres, located throughout South Africa, with visa service provider VFS Global. This is to ensure the facilitation of legitimate travel with processes that are robust, effective, and fair.

The South Africa Desk publishes guidance for applicants, target processing times and weekly decision reports, at the following webpage:

www.irishimmigration.ie/south-africa-visa-desk/.

The current target processing times for visa applications submitted to the South Africa Visa Desk are 6 to 8 weeks for applications to visit family/friend and approximately 12 weeks for tourist applications.

I can advise the Deputy that visas are being issued largely in line with the published target processing times. Applicants are advised that unforeseen delays can arise, which are outside the control of the Visa Desk. With this in mind, my officials recommend that, for short stay visas, applicants should apply up to 90 days in advance of their proposed travel dates and that applicants should not book flights until they have received and validated their visa.

If an application has significantly exceeded the above times, it is possible that, on initial assessment, the application has not met the criteria to be issued a visa, and further assessment/verification is required. In such instances, processing times will be longer than those stated above.

Any applicant can now directly check the status of their visa application on the Immigration Service’s new Digital Contact Centre (DCC). They can register for, or log in to their existing account, at:

portal.irishimmigration.ie/en/.

As an Oireachtas member, you can also request the status of individual immigration cases by e-mail, using the Oireachtas Mail facility at: IMoireachtasmail@justice.ie, 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 Question process.