update on visa reqts US

Many thanks to all who responded to the original post. Just to clarify
matters, I've spoken to the embassy and if you've ever been arrested by the
police, for anything, no matter what the outcome of the case, you cannot
travel under the Visa Waiver scheme and have to apply for a Visa. They
reckon that from 26 October, all passengers will be fingerprinted and
checked against police records (however I am not sure WHICH police records,
US or UK) So I am not going to chance being turned away so I've made an
appointment for a visa appointment.
However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes. Then I have to take a day off work
to go down to London (only other place is Belfast and it MUST be a personal
interview), pay for travel from Manchester to London then pay £72 for the
Visa.Which is getting on towards what the flights to NY actually cost! I
can understand this palaver if I had been actually convicted of anything but
I'm totally innocent and so am really miffed about it.

"Stef" wrote in message
...

....
However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes. Then I have to take a day off work
to go down to London (only other place is Belfast and it MUST be a personal
interview), pay for travel from Manchester to London then pay £72 for the
Visa.Which is getting on towards what the flights to NY actually cost!.....

If this is a purely business trip then surely your employer will reimburse the
costs of obtaining the required visa.

"Stef" wrote in message
...

....
However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes. Then I have to take a day off work
to go down to London (only other place is Belfast and it MUST be a personal
interview), pay for travel from Manchester to London then pay £72 for the
Visa.Which is getting on towards what the flights to NY actually cost!.....

If this is a purely business trip then surely your employer will reimburse the
costs of obtaining the required visa.

"Stef" wrote in message
...

....
However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes. Then I have to take a day off work
to go down to London (only other place is Belfast and it MUST be a personal
interview), pay for travel from Manchester to London then pay £72 for the
Visa.Which is getting on towards what the flights to NY actually cost!.....

If this is a purely business trip then surely your employer will reimburse the
costs of obtaining the required visa.

the flights to NY actually cost!.....

If this is a purely business trip then surely your employer will reimburse
the
costs of obtaining the required visa.



And if you are travelling to the US for the purpose of conducting buisness,
if you follow the rules, surely you need a visa?




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"Stef" wrote in message
...
Many thanks to all who responded to the original post. Just to clarify
matters, I've spoken to the embassy and if you've ever been arrested by the
police, for anything, no matter what the outcome of the case, you cannot
travel under the Visa Waiver scheme and have to apply for a Visa. They
reckon that from 26 October, all passengers will be fingerprinted and
checked against police records (however I am not sure WHICH police records,
US or UK) So I am not going to chance being turned away so I've made an
appointment for a visa appointment.
I would imagine this is the US-VISIT system they are refering to, which has access to all US
fingerprint data.

While I was aware that the US is presently fingerprinting all non-US arrivals *with* visas, I wasn't
aware that they were going to do the same to all those ariving under the visa waiver programme from
26 October.

Does anyone have more information on this?

UK Police forces do not give copies of their fingerprint databases to the US authorities. However,
fingerprints of wanted person and major criminals are shared via Interpol, and the US would have
copies of those.

However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes.
The US is a capitalist country. What else would you expect.

Then I have to take a day off work
to go down to London (only other place is Belfast and it MUST be a personal
interview), pay for travel from Manchester to London then pay £72 for the
Visa.Which is getting on towards what the flights to NY actually cost! I
can understand this palaver if I had been actually convicted of anything but
I'm totally innocent and so am really miffed about it.

The reason the US counts arrests as a "problem" is that their view is that arrested people are often
guilty and get off through lack of evidence or a clever-dick lawyer who finds a "technicality".

It's a load of crap of course, since if you want to screw up someone's life in the US all you do is
make an anonymous tip-off which gets them arrested. AFAIK arrests are public data in much of the
USA, so can be checked by prospective employers, credit agencies etc..

"Stef" wrote in message
...
Many thanks to all who responded to the original post. Just to clarify
matters, I've spoken to the embassy and if you've ever been arrested by the
police, for anything, no matter what the outcome of the case, you cannot
travel under the Visa Waiver scheme and have to apply for a Visa. They
reckon that from 26 October, all passengers will be fingerprinted and
checked against police records (however I am not sure WHICH police records,
US or UK) So I am not going to chance being turned away so I've made an
appointment for a visa appointment.
I would imagine this is the US-VISIT system they are refering to, which has access to all US
fingerprint data.

While I was aware that the US is presently fingerprinting all non-US arrivals *with* visas, I wasn't
aware that they were going to do the same to all those ariving under the visa waiver programme from
26 October.

Does anyone have more information on this?

UK Police forces do not give copies of their fingerprint databases to the US authorities. However,
fingerprints of wanted person and major criminals are shared via Interpol, and the US would have
copies of those.

However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes.
The US is a capitalist country. What else would you expect.

Then I have to take a day off work
to go down to London (only other place is Belfast and it MUST be a personal
interview), pay for travel from Manchester to London then pay £72 for the
Visa.Which is getting on towards what the flights to NY actually cost! I
can understand this palaver if I had been actually convicted of anything but
I'm totally innocent and so am really miffed about it.

The reason the US counts arrests as a "problem" is that their view is that arrested people are often
guilty and get off through lack of evidence or a clever-dick lawyer who finds a "technicality".

It's a load of crap of course, since if you want to screw up someone's life in the US all you do is
make an anonymous tip-off which gets them arrested. AFAIK arrests are public data in much of the
USA, so can be checked by prospective employers, credit agencies etc..

"Richard White" wrote in message
...

However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes.

The US is a capitalist country. What else would you expect.

Can't you google for a standard landline number?

A search on 0207 us embassy grosvenor got me 0207 499 9000 and a load of similar
numbers. All premium rate numbers have to be fed into a regular "recipient"
landline number (which is often not openly promoted for obvious reasons), but may
have "leaked" to google at some stage.

"Richard White" wrote in message
...

However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes.

The US is a capitalist country. What else would you expect.

Can't you google for a standard landline number?

A search on 0207 us embassy grosvenor got me 0207 499 9000 and a load of similar
numbers. All premium rate numbers have to be fed into a regular "recipient"
landline number (which is often not openly promoted for obvious reasons), but may
have "leaked" to google at some stage.

"Richard White" wrote in message
...

However to add insult to injury, the number you dial to make an appointment
is a premium rate number at £1.50 a minute and by the time I'd listened to
the recorded message and actually got through to make the appointment it
must have been a minimum of 10 minutes.

The US is a capitalist country. What else would you expect.

Can't you google for a standard landline number?

A search on 0207 us embassy grosvenor got me 0207 499 9000 and a load of similar
numbers. All premium rate numbers have to be fed into a regular "recipient"
landline number (which is often not openly promoted for obvious reasons), but may
have "leaked" to google at some stage.