Sightseeing not a good enough reason for a visa to visit Britain
A Reuters report says that holidaymakers who only say they plan to sightsee during a visit to Britain could find their tourist visa applications being refused, a monitoring body said in a report.
It is a standard reason given for not granting tourist visas, the Independent Monitor for Entry Clearance Refusals, Linda Costelloe Baker, found in her annual report, but would-be visitors who have never before travelled abroad could also find it difficult to holiday in Britain.
Costelloe Baker cited one case where an applicant had been told by an officer: “You have never previously undertaken any foreign travel before and I can see little reason for this trip.”
“This is a common reason for refusal,” she added.
“Entry clearance officers can use some ridiculous reasons when refusing a visa for tourist visits,” Costelloe Baker said.
She cited one case where an applicant who had previously travelled abroad was refused entry because the countries were “nowhere near the UK”.
In another case the applicant was told he or she did not have a “sufficient command of the language for the purposes of tourism”.
Costelloe Baker said in her report: “Well, if knowledge of the language was a requirement for travel, that would certainly stop lots of British citizens going on their hols.”
Taking annual vacation in this country was not a good enough reason for one entry clearance officer, while wanting to visit friends near the seaside fell short for another applicant from St Petersburg because he had not said where he wanted to visit.
A would-be tourist who wanted to stay in a hotel in London while visiting friends in Surrey and Kent was turned down because the entry officer had misread it as Cirencester “far from his friends”.
Despite such flaws there had been a “significant improvement in quality”, she added.
The department, UKvisas, formed in 2000 as a joint Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Home Office initiative, received 2.2 million applications between January 2006 and September 2006, of which it issued 1.8 million visas, with applicants paying £163 million to go through the application process.
Costelloe Baker found 86% of refusal notices overall were reasonable and provided correct information about the rights of appeal.
Report by The Mole from Reuters
John Alwyn-Jones
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