On 25th January the President signed the amendment to the Act on specific solutions related to the prevention, counteraction and eradication of COVID-19, other infectious diseases and resulting from them crisis situations, as well as some other legal acts. The act changes, potentially in a revolutionary way, the Act on foreigners in the aspect of issuing visas. It significantly expands the competence of the Minister of Foreign Affairs in the area of issuing visas, as until now he was authorized to issue them only to the members of the diplomatic and consular corps.
The Minister will issue a visa, but he will not process all applications
The Minister of Foreign Affairs will have the competence to process a visa application transmitted by the consul that had accepted it. The Minister will not process all applications, but only those that were submitted in a country included on the list that will be compiled by the ordinance that the Minister will issue, as well as those that satisfy the requirements mentioned in the ordinance, if that will be the case. The criterion of including a specific country on the list is defined as “the need to provide a smooth visa service to foreigners”.
The consul’s role in the process
It should be mentioned that foreigners will still need to submit their visa applications at Polish consulates abroad. The applications will then be scanned and sent to Poland, where they will be processed and the decisions on visa rejection/issuance will be made. The consulates will still print visa stickers and place them in applicants’ passports. Should a visa interview be needed, this will be organized by the consul as well.
Other prerogatives of the Minister
Should an application for the re-examination of the case be lodged (also submitted at the consulate), it will be processed by the Minister as well. The Minister will also be able to revoke or cancel a visa he had issued.
Potential benefits
This partial digitalization of the visa process can in the long term significantly facilitate it and lessen the workload of Polish consulates located in countries where the demand for visas is heightened or where the extraordinary situation calls for it (such as in Belarus). On the other hand, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been working on facilitating the visa process in other ways for quite some time now. Another tool with this aim in mind is visa outsourcing that the Ministry has been gradually rolling out over the last decade. It involves contracting external service providers to accept visa applications on behalf of consulates.
Involving central authorities in the visa process has been allowed based on the recent amendment of the Schengen Visa Code. Several Schengen countries (i.e. Finland) have been successfully using it for a while.
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