Visa Processing

The last few weeks were very hectic as I had officially resigned from my job, and had to pack my bags (and 8 years worth lugguage) and bring it back home. Needless to say, goodbyes are not really my speciality. But now that I am at home, I realised how much more work I have to do. 

Meanwhile, I have applied for the Canadian Student's Visa. The one-stop shop for Visa related details is VFS-Canada. 

The Canadian Visa processing consists of the following stages:

- Supporting Documents collection by the candidate 

- Application and Passport Submission

- Health Check up request from the High Commission, and resubmission of the passport upon completion of the same.

- Interview (if need arises)

- Receipt of the stamped passport! 

To be honest, I was very concerned about the visa processing, but based on my experience, I can safely state that this is the easiest stage. Once your documents are in place, the visa processing pretty must goes in auto-pilot mode. 

Supporting Documents collection by the candidate: 

This, by far, is the most rigorous part of the visa application stage. I call it rigorous because it takes about 1 full day to get all your documents in place. Some of the documents that are needed are:

- A CA certificate that evaluates all your (and your sponsor's) assets. This is inclusive of property, monetory savings, investments, education loan, and a host of other assets. For a sample certificate, please email me at g.shivnarayan@gmail.com and I can share a certificate.

- An affidavit that states that your sponsors are willing to sponsor you. Again, email me for a sample.

- Your bank loan sanction letter (if you have applied for an education loan). 

- Family banking records for the past 24 months (bank books and statements, accompanied by bank certificates dated within last three months)

- Income Tax documents for yourself and your parents (for past 2 years) (Form 16s that belong to you and your sponsor).

- Proof of employment from each of your parent's and your employer (salary fund statement, provident funds statement, employment contracts). Please also provide letters of employment from each of your parent's employer, including the company's full name, the address and the telephone number of the employer/supervisor, the length of service and the salary details). Basically, a copy of your offer letter, most recent salary hike / promotion letter, offer letters of previous organizations.

- A copy of the checklist is present in the VFS site.

Application and Passport Submission

The IMM1294B (or the student information form), Personal information form are the two forms that we need to fill. In addition, we have to sign a consent form and a student questionnaire form. The student questionnaire form has a few questions like why you are pursuing the course, why Canada, and what are your career plans. These are questions that can be answered from your SoP / essays. 

Upon submission of the passport, one has to make a payment of about Rs 6000. This includes the consulate charges and VFS charges. Please note that I submitted 2 passport size photographs (2 Inches X 1.5 Inches) along with the first package.

Health Check up request from the High Commission, and resubmission of the passport upon completion of the same

After about a week of submission, I received a letter from the High Commission requesting me to perform a heath checkup. The letter also had my passport attached. The health checkup again consists of three stages: A general health checkup (Height, weight, eyes, medical situation etc), a blood and urine test for HIV and a few other diseases and an X-Ray test. I had to submit 2 passport sized photographs along with their negative. Getting a negative can be a little difficult in this age of digital photography. I had to run to atleast 6 studios and pay a bomb to get a negative. But more on that later. :)

The health checkup was hazzle free. Upon completion of the tests, I resubmitted the passport to the VFS office. Again, I had to fill a form that listed the documents I was submitting. 

Interview (if need arises)

The interview stage is not a mandatory stage. If the High Commission deems it necessary to conduct an interview, then one has to travel to Delhi. So far, none in my batch had to undergo an interview. 

Receipt of the stamped passport

At the time of posting, I have not yet received my stamped passport. But, I understand that the stamping takes about 1 week from the time of re-submission of the passport. Shall update the post with the documents I received with the stamped passport soon.

Loan Documents 101

Good news after quite a bit of wait. I have received my loan sanctioned and have applied for my visa. Often, getting the loan documents in place can take much more time than you can imagine.  

In my case, it took 3 weeks from the time of submission. I had applied to the Corporation Bank of India for their education loan. 

Outlined below is the list of documents that one must have in place for applying for a loan in any bank in India. This list might vary from bank to bank, but what I have listed is a possible list of ALL documents that one might need:

Guarantor:

1. 2-4 copies of passport size photograph

2. Proof of Identity (passport/PAN card/Driving license etc.)

3. Proof residence (electricity/telephone bill/ration card)

4. Statement of Bank A/c for last six months

5. Exiting loan statement for last six months.

6. Signature verification from the Banker

7. Income Tax Return for last two years (with form 16 for salary person)

8. Balance Sheet for last three years.

9.Last three months salary slips.

10. Details of fund available from family sources for the course.(attach Xerox copies)

11. Statement of Assets & Liabilities.

12 Career Profile/Employment details of the 10 years

13.Sales Tax Registration, Shop Establishment Act Certificate etc.(for Businessman) 

DOCUMENTS RELATING TO PROPERTY TO BE MORTGAGED (ABOVE 7.5/- LACS) 

1. Agreement to sale with Builder if first owner

2. Agreement to sale with previous owner if flat is resale. All previous agreement to sale upto first owner & builder.

3. Registration certificate of society.

4. conveyance deed between building society.

5. NOC from society.

6. Share Certificate of society.

7. Latest maintenace charges bill.

STUDENT 

1. Two / Four copies of passport size photograph

2. Proof of Identity (passport/PAN card/Driving license/College ID Card etc.)

3. Proof residence (electricity/telephone bill/ration card)

4. Statement of marks: SSC, HSC, FY, SY, TY, Final year  of Degree

5. Degree certificate Graduation, Post Graduation, Diploma

6.Statement of extra curricular activites

7. Copies of letter conferring scolarship, freeship, studentship etc.

8. Documet evidencing the duration of the course & commencement thereof Viz Prospectus or certificate from the competent authority of the institution.

9. Proof of admission to the course (I-20)

10. Schedule of expenses for the course.

11. Copy of the mark sheet of qualifying examinationViz. CAT,TOEFL,GRE,ILTS etc.

12. Statement of Bank A/c for last 12 months through which major transactions are routed (if employed)

13. Signature verification from the banker (if employed)

14. A declaration/ an affidavit confirming that n loans are availed from other banker(if employed )

15. Letter giving reasons if in case of gap in the course of education. 

16. Letter indicating that you have officially resigned from your job.

17. In case of any personal loans, a letter indicating your payment schedule, amount to be repaid and expected months of repayment.

I understand that this list can be quite daunting. Again, this is a comprehensive list of ALL documents I was asked to furnish by most banks. I approached as many as 4 banks (3 nationalized and 1 private banks). Since a loan is almost mandatory for an international education, I would recommend that an MBA aspirant works on getting these documents in place as soon as he/she has applied to a school, rather than wait for the result, and then applying for the loan. Once the documents are in place, upon receipt of the admission offer, the candidate can make his loan processing much easier. In my case, I had exactly 2 months from the time of receiving an admission offer to the course start. Within this space I had to make a decision, apply for loan, visa and book tickets. This can be extremely hectic. 

Lesson learnt was it is never too early to get your documents in place. On the contrary, it would be wise to do so.

From acceptance mail to reaching the Business school - A stepwise process of the tedious tasks

This post aims at outlining the steps that follow after one receives an acceptance mail from the school. As I am realizing, getting the writing the GMAT, applying to the school and interviewing and getting an acceptance mail is amounts to just 60% of the work. The real work for most international (and local students) starts after that.

1. Get a Pay order for 2000 CAD and send it to Queen's School of Business. The school will process your Pay order and send across the enrollment package.
2. Get a loan - expected time - 2-3 weeks. Most students start analyzing the interest rates offered by the banks only after getting an admit. Based on my experience, I would say, it is better to start taking to prospective bankers as soon as your applications are done. As far as banks are concerned, the more time you spend talking to bankers, the better it is. The paperwork can be quite tedious and it is better to set aside at least a month for the bank related processing. For Indian applicants, the maximum amount you can apply for is Rs 20Lakhs, and for that one must show collateral and a co-signer. Talk to the bankers and get the documentation needed for validating the collateral. Additionally, bear in mind that loan has to be processed from the location where your parents / co-signer stays. Hence a 3 - 4 week period for loan processing is a safe assumption.

3. Work out the remaining amount - Can be done along side bank processing - Ensure that you have assets for the remaining 15 Lakh INR by means of parental funding, savings, borrowing from relatives, provident funds, etc.

4. Get a net worth letter from your CA - 2 - 3 days - Once your education loan has been sanctioned, get a net worth letter from your Chartered Accountant. A net worth certificate is a financial evaluation of the applicant and people who are going to financially support the applicant through the course of his program. Evaluation will consider the education loan amt in addition to any liquid assets, fixed assets you, your sponsors have. This takes a day if u know the CA well. Also get an affidavit mentioning the individial sponsors whose financial assets were accounted for in the net worth certificate. This should take about 2-3 days at the maximum, if you know the CA well.

5. Visa Documents: Keep in touch with VFS meanwhile and ask them the list of documents you need to submit for visa purposes.

6. Submit all relevant forms / supporting documents to VFS with a demand draft of the amount for applying for Student Visa. This detail is present in the VFS Website. VFS sends this to Canadian Embassy, and you get your medical test letter. This takes a week.

7. Get a medical test done (3-4 days) as mentioned in the letter from the embassy. The test takes 1 day, but bear estimate at least 2 days gap from the date you receive the medical test letter and the actual date of medical test.

8. Get Visa Stamped - 1 week - 10 days - Resend your passport to Canadian Embassy with your medical test results. You get your passport stamped within a week.

9. Book flight tickets to Canada. Again, like the loan processing, it is better to plan the flight tickets in advance to ensure that you get good deals. Also, some travel agents block flight tickets for about a month in advance. Pursue that option actively too.

10. Shop - On going - Get formal wear, suites, thermals, and a sweater. Do not but winter wear, as it is recommended to get winter wear from Canada. More on shopping at a later post.

11. Fly to Kingston. :)

Additionally, these are the other things that can be done, on a need basis:
(a) Parallely finish any assignments that has been given by the school. These assignments are present in the enrollment package.

(b) Search for houses online. Get an idea of the expected rent in Kingston. I have decided to live outside, and not take up Grad Res. The formula I am following is to look up craigslist / Kijiji.ca and get the address of the apartment. Then, map the address in google maps and find out the time taken to walk to campus. This not only helps you understand the real estate pricing there, but also helps you understand the geography. I believe that this really helps you in intangible ways, and also gets you excited about the place.

While making a checklist of things to do, it is better to go backwards. So, assuming that you are scheduled to fly on May 1st, then, allot 3 weeks for Visa + 4 days for medical test + 3 days for net worth certificate and 1 month for loan processing. So, it is better to plan the tasks so that the paperwork is started by March 1st week (February last week).