Faster Consular Appointment Scheduling to Become Available for Skilled Indian Nationals

The situation

The Czech Consulate in New Delhi will schedule up to 500 priority appointments for employee card applications filed by highly-skilled Indian nationals.

A closer look

• Eligibility. The priority appointments are available to Indian applicants who plan to sign a local employment contract with a Czech company. Their position must also be highly skilled, which depends on the Czech national job classification code (applicants must fall within International Standard Classification of Occupations code 1-3). Finally, the applicant must intend to file an Employee Card application.
• Appointment limit. The Consulate will allow applicants to schedule 500 priority appointments per calendar year.
• Start date. The priority appointments will be scheduled starting October 1, 2018. It is not yet known whether or how the Consulate will distribute the quota. 

Impact

Although the application process itself will not be expedited, priority applicants will no longer be subject to current lengthy appointment booking delays that are ongoing due to the termination of the Visapoint appointment system in November 2017.

Background

The delays from the Visapoint system termination resulted in a temporary suspension of appointments from March to May 2018. Since then, the monthly appointment quota has been filled quickly, with many applicants having to wait one or more months to obtain an appointment.

Looking ahead

Fragomen will keep clients informed if the Czech Ministry publishes further updates on the quota distribution.

This alert is for informational purposes only. If you have any questions, please contact the global immigration professional with whom you work at Fragomen or send an email to [email protected].