Tracking Schengen visa

[scoobydoolondon]

Good morning

Checked the status on my wife's Schengen visa application today and it states:

Your Passport Status
Application has been received at the Embassy of Swiss, London on 28/07/2016.

Does anyone know what are the various states the application goes through?
And what level of granularity is shown on the online status?

For example, will it state "Processing" or "Completed", etc before it perhaps says "ready for collection"

thanks

[cs95tdg]

I don't recall what the statuses are, but do know that you get a notification from the intermediary (tls contact or vfs) when the embassy returns your passport to them and it's ready for collection.

I don't recall the statuses being that detailed or even updated that much during the time the application was being processed. May be one update to say the application had been sent to the embassy, another to say it was being processed, and a final that it was ready for collection.

[scoobydoolondon]

Thanks for the update.

I'm not usually bothered about such interim updates but we have a hotel booked for 8 nights which is refundable before 13th Aug so ideally I'd like to have the visa before that date.

We fly out on 26th Aug, so don't know what to do if the visa doesn't arrive before that the 13th. And Swiss hotels are not cheap, hence my concern!

Currently the status remains: "Application has been received at the Embassy of Swiss, London on 28/07/2016.". If I saw "Processing" I'd be happier.

Is there any way I check on the application and how far its progressed?

[cs95tdg]

Not sure what you were advised by the tls/vfs when you enquired at the time you submitted your application, but I've always received my passport back within 5-10 days from submission. Note however my applications were never made during peak holiday periods.

You may want to check their website or enquire to find out what their standard processing times are now. I'm not aware of any way to check individual application statuses, other than what's recorded online.

[scoobydoolondon]

I just got an email reply when I queried my application with the Swiss Embassy.

They reply was simply:

I can confirm that your application is pending in the Schengen consultation process.

Not sure if this means my application is in the queue and hasn't been looked at, or its currently being processed.

The online VFS status is still the same.

[cs95tdg]

How long has it been since you submitted your application?

Agree that the status doesn't give away much, it could be either that it's in a queue or being processed. But with that wording I'm more included to believe that it's being processed, or at least they are doing the necessary background checks.

I suspect that the vfs would only get a final update once the embassy has completed processing the application.

[scoobydoolondon]

A quick update for the group following a call with VFS.

There appear to be 3 statuses;
- pending (not sure what the exact text would state)
- Application has been received at the Embassy of Swiss, London on <date>
- application progressed (again, not sure what the exact text is)

First one means the Embassy require further documentation.
Second one means the application is currently under consideration
Third one means the Embassy have finished.

VFS receive their documents from Embassy around 1pm and the status is updated daily, around 2-3pm from that documentation.

Hope that helps the group

[lilit]

Hey, did you have any progress on this?
My application (for a Germany Schengen visa) is in the same state, just says "has been received at the German Visa Application Centre, London on 8/2/2016 for further processing.

[scoobydoolondon]

Yes, I did. Got the email and text update stating Passport was ready for collection yesterday, so managed to pick it.

The VFS online status was as follows:

Your Passport Status
Application has been returned to the visa application centre,London on 08/08/2016 and is available for collection Mon–Fri 16.00–17.30pm,excluding declared holidays.If you have opted for courier/postal,your passport will be dispatched for delivery the next working day.

Application was submitted on July 28th and picked up on 8th July, which is only 5 working days, if you exclude the day of submission and collection (plus there was a Swiss national holiday on 1st Aug).

All in all, I'm impressed with the speed of processing, I was expecting longer.