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Canadian commission comes to aid of student visa applicants facing issues due to Covid
This comes as the situation of the student visa applicants continues to be grim due to the pandemic.
In a bid to clear the backlog of student visas, the Canadian High Commission in India on Friday came up with a special arrangement and opened a dedicated biometric appointments queue so that the process of biometrics is completed sooner.
“Taking into consideration the increased demand from Canada student visa customers in India for earlier biometric appointments, VFS Global and high commission of Canada now provide a dedicated queue on the appointment system with increased capacity. Customers applying for all other visa categories are requested to avoid booking appointments under the student visa category,” Visa Facilitation Services (VFS) Global said in a statement.
This comes as the situation of the student visa applicants continues to be grim due to the pandemic.
Students who have already booked their biometrics appointment will need to cancel their existing appointment in order to book an earlier date using the dedicated queue on the Appointment Management System (AMS).
“This priority service is available only for study permits, short-term study and returning students. VFS will cancel appointments from all other applicants booked under the student-dedicated queue on the AMS. “AMS link” https://t.co/ZxBEaDE98S,” read a tweet from the high commission on Friday.
As the student visa applicants remain to be in a dicey situation, reports of fraud agents also have come to light. In a statement issued to the applicants, VFS Global said, “Customers are advised to beware of fraudulent entities who charge fees from customers for scheduling appointments, using VFS Global’s name or independently”.
British Deputy High Commission too issued an advisory regarding visa fraudsters.
In a series of tweets on Wednesday, the British Deputy High Commission (BDHC) listed tips to avoid visa scams and stressed that UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) and visa outsourcing and technology services specialist, VFS Global, would never ask customers to share personal information via social media, and said scammers could use this for online trickery.
Pointing out that UKVI or VFS would never ask for visa payments by email or phone, it said that one should pay for the visa application online and if there were any suspicions or incidents, it had to be reported on the link https://actionfraud.police.uk.
