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US raises visa fees
Washington:America's admission price is going up. Beginning January most people will have to shell out more money for US visas.
The higher charges will help pay for increased processing costs caused by new security measures imposed after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
The State Department said on Thursday it will raise application fees for tourist, business and student visas by 31 per cent, from $100 to $131, and for immigrant visas by 6 per cent, from $335 to $355, on January 1, 2008.
The department is required by law to cover the cost of the additional procedures, including more complete fingerprinting of applicants, through the fees it charges. But since the last price bump in 2002, it has absorbed losses.
"We are now collecting 10 fingerprints from each applicant and the cost charged by the FBI to review those fingerprints no longer allows us to do this," according to a statement released.
The only foreign visitors unaffected by the increases will be citizens of the 27 mainly European countries that are part of a waiver program and who do not require US visas unless they want to stay in the US for longer than 90 days at one time.
Those countries are: Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Britain, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
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