Europe — Schengen
The most document-heavy of the five, and the least forgiving about mismatched dates. Which country you apply to is decided by where you spend the most nights, not where you land.
We file around 1,800 visa applications a year. Long enough to know what each consulate actually asks for, which is not always what the checklist says.
That decision belongs to the consulate and to nobody else. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you something. What we can promise is that your file will not be the reason it fails — and that we will tell you before you pay a fee if we think it will.
Not bad luck. Almost always one of these, and every one of them is fixable before the file goes in.
Your hotel booking, your ticket and your travel insurance must show exactly the same dates. Not similar. The same. A single day out is enough.
Six months, bank-stamped, dated within a few days of the appointment. Consulates look at the balance and at how it got there. A large deposit landing the week before raises more questions than it answers.
If you have no income of your own, a sponsor is not optional — the consulate requires one, along with proof of your relationship to them. This is the single most common thing families get wrong.
Most countries want six months beyond your return date, and some count from the day you arrive. Easier to fix in March than in the week you fly.
Schengen sets a floor on medical cover and the policy has to say so on its face. A travel policy bought for the wrong sum is the same as no policy.
Appointment slots, not processing time, are usually what runs out. In peak season the first free appointment can be weeks away. We would rather start early and wait than start late and hope.
Every consulate has its own temperament. These are the ones we handle week in, week out, and where our checklists come from experience rather than a website.
The most document-heavy of the five, and the least forgiving about mismatched dates. Which country you apply to is decided by where you spend the most nights, not where you land.
A separate application from Schengen, whatever else is on your itinerary. Plan it as its own project, with its own timeline.
Long processing at the wrong time of year. This is the one where starting early matters more than anything else you can do.
Filed online, which people take to mean quick. The paperwork behind it is as demanding as anywhere else.
The most straightforward of these, and still not a formality. Worth doing properly if it is a stopover on a longer trip.
The interview is the application. Everything you file exists to support a conversation of a few minutes, in which the officer is deciding one thing — that you intend to come home. Appointment availability, not paperwork, usually sets your timeline.
Ask for more entries than you think you need. A single entry is spent the moment you leave the country — including by sea. We have seen a cruise sailing out of Shanghai catch a traveller on exactly that.
Now filed online for Indian passports, with nothing pasted into the passport — you carry the notice on your phone. Straightforward, but not instant, and rooms and rail in the blossom and autumn weeks go months ahead.
We also file for the UAE, South Korea and others. Visa rules move, and some of these move often — ask us where the position stands today rather than trusting anything written a year ago, including this page.
The single most expensive mistake we watch people make is booking flights first and applying afterwards. A cheap fare is not worth a refused application, and a consulate will not hurry for a ticket you have already bought.
Come to us with your dates before you commit to them. We will tell you what is realistic, hold what can be held, and ticket once you can actually travel.
We'll tell you what the visa will need, and whether the timeline works.
Start a visa file