I know that the D-Visa processing varies from case to case and different embassies will have different processing times but I want to see if I can get answers from the people who went through the same process. These questions are for people who needed a D-visa to come to Switzerland while their spouses were on B-permit.
Q1. How long did it take for the embassy to process your D-visa application (actual time from the time of submission) for family reunification?
Q2. Which embassy did the processing of your case?
For my family reunification visa, it took three months from the time of submission to getting my passport back. If I remember correctly, application and passport were sent to the embassy in Atlanta (since I'm from Texas). I just mailed everything in. No appointment, no interview.
I would like to understand any experience of family reunion processing time for NON EU, at canton TI.
We have applied on the early February 2017. Application from Embassy arrived in less then 10 days. It took me 2 weeks to fill some requirements requested by migration office and the application was processed to the municipality, where I had appointment by the End of March.
Application was approved by commune and accepted as a favorable, that I fill all condition standards, like apartment enough big, salary etc.
Since then, I have no news, and application is on Belinzona.
Does anybody knows what would be approximate time until I receive response?
is there a chance to be refused if the application is accepted by commune?
Thank you very much for the English forum that is helping young residents in Switzerland to find information.
Have you contacted Bellinzona to see where the application is at? Sometimes these things fall through the cracks as it were - it may be sitting in a file somewhere.
In fact yes, but since they don't speak very well English, it was hard to understand what was the person saying, but as per my understanding was that, there can be some delays because of to many demands, but what she can do is to insert a reminder so maybe will be processed a bit faster.
My concern was that I have two children that are on the age to decide either to register on the high school (my son) or do nothing since they will start in CH.
If something goes wrong, my son can lose one year...
Yes. Best if you put your enquiries, in writing, in Italian. Ask someone to help you. Or go to the office and take an interpreter with you.
Perhaps you could phrase this positively "my children, aged 99 and 99, are looking forward to starting the new school year in Switzerland", and then get it translated into Italian, and send this in a letter, asking, please, for confirmation that they will be able to do so.
Yes, was exactly what I expressed when I called them, and the girls was nice to me and said that she will put a reminder on the SIMIC so maybe will be processed a bit faster.
I guess I have to wait and cross fingers to receive positive answer.
Today I called again the Migration office, and understood that the file was not processed yet.
After explanation about urgency to register my children in School and the importance of their age, they told me that they will process with urgency and that they can not do nothing faster than next week.
Next week in fact will be very good for me! I hope that I will have something as being told by authorities, and for sure will keep you updated.
As I wrote that I will keep you updated, I would like to inform you that today I have called the cantonal office, and they informed me that application is accepted, and I can expect today to receive the letter of confirmation.
I will now have sufficient time to bring my family and prepare my children to start the School in Switzerland.
I am an Indian citizen married to an Indian citizen working in Geneva on L permit. I had applied for my Family Re-unification visa (type D) in March 2017. After that my husband received a letter to submit documents from the migration office in Geneva in May which he submitted. Since then he visited the office to check on the application status but no answer was given. Then in June he was asked to submit one more certificate which again he did. Since it has been six weeks and 20 weeks in total and we do not have any answer on our application till now. My husband has been living in Switzerland since the last 7 years. Can anyone please give me any kind of information on how we can get the status of our application. We are newly married (since the last six months) and since then we have not been able to live together. It is really getting depressing now. So if anyone has any help or advise it would be great.
6 to 8 weeks is the Ideal time for processing. You can write an email to Geneva Immigration office , asking for status. Attach your husband's permit copy in the email.
Depending on the missing documents or additional information, the timeline may differ.
Yes I tried to e-mail them and visited the website but there's no e-mail id given on their website. Only phone no. is given, I tried calling them but there's an automated message in French no option for English and sadly I have just started learning French so I couldn't understand what they said. My husband has visited the migration office several times but they did not provide him with any information.
He was initially on a student visa 7 years back, he was studying for his masters in engineering from EPFL, later got a job in Georg Fischer and since then he is on L permit. He has to get it renewed every year, infact he got it renewed again for this year recently so I am pretty sure its allowed. I have already asked the Swiss Embassy in India and they have not given any satisfactory answer as I said earlier also my husband has also visited the Geneva Migration office several times but they also have not given any satisfactory answer.
Strange, I thought students usually got a B when studying here. It’s not a problem if it was an L since being a student won’t count for the limitation for being employed on an L. I guess the question may be how long he still has on an employment L. 3 years is the max; his employer will either have to apply for a B permit for him or they’ll let him go since the permit can’t be extended. From the Foreign Nationals Act:
" Chapter 6: Regulation of the Period of stay
Art. 32 Short stay permit
1 The short stay permit is granted for limited periods of stay of up to one year.
2 It is granted for a specific purpose of stay and may be made subject to additional conditions.
3 It may be extended by up to two years. A change of job is only possible for good cause.
4 The short stay permit may only be granted again after an appropriate interruption of stay in Switzerland."
When did he renew the L? If it’s fairly recently that might explain the delay, Geneva not sure it would need renewing to start with and now it has been they’ve got to process the family reunification application.
All you can do it be patient and check with them every couple of weeks.