French Schengen Visa-London Embassy- Direct Consulate Appnt

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 5:25 pm Post subject:

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Hi,

I applied for Schengen visa through french embassy on 4th Nov 2010. I applied direct through French Consulate and not through TLS contact services. Today I got my visa. I thought I'll share my experience on this and hope this will help someone.

I called TLS contact services at 0845 7300 118 and booked for an appointment with french consulate direct. Just day before the appointment i got a call back from them just to confirm about my appointment.

There is no proof of email or number that you can take with you for this appointment. On the appointment day go to TLS contact service as early as possible, as this will be served on first come first serve basis,

Representative from french consulate will be available in TLS centre to collect your documents. TLS centre receptionist will direct you to the consulate representative, they already have the details of those who has booked appointment by phone. Just submit all the documents and pay the visa fees. I paid 53.10 GBP only and not the TLS admin fee. I also gave them Royal Mail Special Delivery envelope with my address. Just note down the track number of the post, so that you can track the mail online. Visa appointment direct with consulate was quick and easier. I got my visa within 2 days.

I hope this helps.

Can i check if you applied only for yourself? also, did they give you a decent length visa (6mts or 1yr)? Thanks for sharing this info. Makes it much better.

I applied as an individual and got the visa for 90 days..

If so, who would ever use TLS? and then it would seem to be the same procedure as previously, but in another building? can you please clarify if anyone could apply and choose to apply directly to the French Consulate? thx

mohanapriyav wrote:Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 5:25 pm Post subject:

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Hi,

I applied for Schengen visa through french embassy on 4th Nov 2010. I applied direct through French Consulate and not through TLS contact services. Today I got my visa. I thought I'll share my experience on this and hope this will help someone.

I called TLS contact services at 0845 7300 118 and booked for an appointment with french consulate direct. Just day before the appointment i got a call back from them just to confirm about my appointment.

There is no proof of email or number that you can take with you for this appointment. On the appointment day go to TLS contact service as early as possible, as this will be served on first come first serve basis,

Representative from french consulate will be available in TLS centre to collect your documents. TLS centre receptionist will direct you to the consulate representative, they already have the details of those who has booked appointment by phone. Just submit all the documents and pay the visa fees. I paid 53.10 GBP only and not the TLS admin fee. I also gave them Royal Mail Special Delivery envelope with my address. Just note down the track number of the post, so that you can track the mail online. Visa appointment direct with consulate was quick and easier. I got my visa within 2 days.

I hope this helps.

Can you please tell me if they had a requirement to have a passport which is not older than 10 years? The french embassy mentions tht the passport shouldnt be older than 10 years, which is to ensure that passport is machine readable?

poshah wrote:Can you please tell me if they had a requirement to have a passport which is not older than 10 years? The french embassy mentions tht the passport shouldnt be older than 10 years, which is to ensure that passport is machine readable?

Why do you think that the information given to you personally or available on the website is not correct?


regards

Sush, on some forums some of the applicants mentioned that they could manage to get away with the 10 year requirement. Hence I wanted to re confirm

Hi,

Thanks for this post. It is really useful.

1. I booked an appointment with TLSContact. I am not sure that I entered correct details about my visit to France and I can not manage to get access to those details. Is there any chance to change them?

2. I also want to change appointment date. But there is no any contact information with TLSContact. I am far away from their office. And 08457300118 phone number is not working. Is this number landline or what?

3. If I will not attend appointment, what happens? I have not paid fees,yet.

Thanks for further replies and helps

I'm not sure if you realise that the original topic is 5 years old, so the information may be out of date.

I applied for a Schengen visa through TLS last November, from memory the process was as follows.
1) Created a account on their website as requested & completed application form online.
https://www.tlscontact.com/gb2fr/login.php
2) Called their contact number to make appointment quoting the online reference number. Contact number is 08457300118, which is still active.
3) Received an email from them confirming appointment booking, which you are required to take printout of on the day of your appointment.

I made a few changes to my form after the appointment was initially booked, by calling them and requesting them to unlock the edit capability. The online form becomes non editable once your appointment is booked. You then download and print the form and take it to your appointment along with the required supporting documents.

It might (should) be easier to bypass the entirely optional external part y(TLS Contact) and make an appointment directly with the French, saving you a service fee in the process. http://www.ambafrance-uk.org/Visas-21435

You can chose to apply at TLS office or at directly the embassy (the latter means no service fee). An application should be granted within 2 weeks of the request as per the Schengen Visacode. It seems that the French do not have allow making an appointment via them anymore so you'd be forced to use that silly website, most unfortunate.

4.4. Direct access
*Maintaining the possibility for visa applicants to lodge their applications directly at the consulate instead of via an external service provider implies that there should be a genuine choice between these two possibilities.
* Even if direct access does not have to be organised under identical or similar conditions to those for access to the service provider, the conditions should not make direct access impossible in practice. Even if it is acceptable to have a different waiting time for obtaining an appointment in the case of direct access, the waiting time should not be so long that it would render direct access impossible in practice.
The different options available for lodging a visa application should be presented plainly to the public, including clear information both on the choice and the cost of the additional services of the external service provider (see Part I, point 4.1)."

From: ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/borders-and-visas/visa-policy/index_en.htm

@Donutz, I believe the process to book the appointment itself remains the same, even if it's a direct embassy appointment you want - unless there have been some recent changes. You call the same number (which is published on the French embassy website) and just ask for a direct embassy appointment, so don't have to pay the TLS fee. I did do this at the time, but wasn't given a date near enough for my travel, so had to re-book one of there's instead.

This was in London though, so don't know if it differs in other locations.

Hi,
Am a master degree student from India, i have applied for french schengen visa on 22nd may 2015, i have applied attestation daccueli from my girl friend family as invitation, at the the time of document verification by the officer in TLS france office , i had no issues , but now if i check my TLS online status am getting red attention saying "some documents are still missing". i am really confused , i have my flight on june 14, what i suppose to do,though i have submitted all the documents whys its showing like this , help please

DIlip

dilip arulappan wrote:Am a master degree student from India, i have applied for french schengen visa on 22nd may 2015, i have applied attestation daccueli from my girl friend family as invitation, at the the time of document verification by the officer in TLS france office , i had no issues , but now if i check my TLS online status am getting red attention saying "some documents are still missing". i am really confused , i have my flight on june 14, what i suppose to do,though i have submitted all the documents whys its showing like this , help please

If the French consulate require any additional supporting documents (while this is rare these days due to documents being checked at the time of application submission, it's not unheard of), they would normally contact you directly - by email/phone or post. Do you know when the status was updated? You should be able to contact them by phone and ask them what's missing, if it's been a while since the status update you have mentioned.

dilip arulappan wrote:Hi,
Am a master degree student from India, i have applied for french schengen visa on 22nd may 2015, i have applied attestation daccueli from my girl friend family as invitation, at the the time of document verification by the officer in TLS france office , i had no issues , but now if i check my TLS online status am getting red attention saying "some documents are still missing". i am really confused , i have my flight on june 14, what i suppose to do,though i have submitted all the documents whys its showing like this , help please

DIlip

Hi, I got the same issue with missing documents. There was one document that I didn't bring but I submitted it later in the same day. Did you finally get your visa?

dantifa wrote:

dilip arulappan wrote:Hi,
Am a master degree student from India, i have applied for french schengen visa on 22nd may 2015, i have applied attestation daccueli from my girl friend family as invitation, at the the time of document verification by the officer in TLS france office , i had no issues , but now if i check my TLS online status am getting red attention saying "some documents are still missing". i am really confused , i have my flight on june 14, what i suppose to do,though i have submitted all the documents whys its showing like this , help please

DIlip

Hi, I got the same issue with missing documents. There was one document that I didn't bring but I submitted it later in the same day. Did you finally get your visa?

Unless the Consulate or TLS get in touch with you about the missing documents, no action from your part is usually required. If you are not notified that the visa is ready after 15 calendar days, then there is an issue and you should get in touch with TLS Contact.

Cayos wrote:

dantifa wrote:

dilip arulappan wrote:Hi,
Am a master degree student from India, i have applied for french schengen visa on 22nd may 2015, i have applied attestation daccueli from my girl friend family as invitation, at the the time of document verification by the officer in TLS france office , i had no issues , but now if i check my TLS online status am getting red attention saying "some documents are still missing". i am really confused , i have my flight on june 14, what i suppose to do,though i have submitted all the documents whys its showing like this , help please

DIlip

Hi, I got the same issue with missing documents. There was one document that I didn't bring but I submitted it later in the same day. Did you finally get your visa?

Unless the Consulate or TLS get in touch with you about the missing documents, no action from your part is usually required. If you are not notified that the visa is ready after 15 calendar days, then there is an issue and you should get in touch with TLS Contact.

Hi ,
I along with my all dependents applied and status displaying in Missing document while those were shown at tlscontact.
An application has been proccessed and displaying status as document is returning to tlscontact.
What does this status mean. Did anyone got visa even had some document missing.

Yes, sometimes the TLS Contact system displays that documents are missing but applicants still get their visas.

Hello guys

Thanks for sharing the experiences.

Regarding direct appointment. How does it work with children under 12 year old. Do the French consulate allow childrens under 12year old. Tls website says they dont allow them. I am outsider to London and I cannot leave my child anywhere just like that.

Does the direct appointment will work for me?
What is the lead time to get an appointment in general if I call today ? How early you get it ?