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A visa policy checklist for corporate travel desks

The visa problems a travel desk can prevent are the ones that begin weeks before anyone applies. A passport is found to be close to expiry, an invitation is requested late, or nobody is sure who signs the employer's letter. A written visa policy settles these in advance. The checklist below is our suggestion of general good practice for companies in India. It is not legal advice, and it does not describe any particular service.

Records to keep before any trip is planned

  • A passport register. For each employee who may travel: name exactly as in the passport, passport number, expiry date and number of blank pages. Review it on a fixed day each quarter.
  • An expiry trigger. Decide how far ahead of expiry the desk asks an employee to renew, and set it with your usual destinations in mind. Requirements differ: a Schengen short-stay visa needs a passport valid at least three months after the intended departure from the Schengen area, with two blank pages, issued within the previous 10 years (EU Visa Code, Article 12). Other destinations set their own rule, so check each one you send people to.
  • A visa register. Visas already held, with validity dates, number of entries and permitted stay. A valid multiple-entry visa may make a new application unnecessary. An expired one explains a past trip.
  • Consent and access. Passport copies, salary details and bank statements are personal data. Collect only what an application needs, tell the employee why, limit who can open the folder, and set a date for deletion. Ask your legal or compliance team how the company's data policy applies.

When a trip is proposed

  • Write down what the employee will actually do. Meetings, a conference, a site inspection, training, or hands-on work at a client's premises are not the same thing to an immigration authority. The UK, for example, lets a Standard Visitor come for certain business activities, such as attending a meeting or interview, but not do paid or unpaid work for a UK company (GOV.UK, Visit the UK as a Standard Visitor). If the activity looks like work at the destination, stop and take proper advice before choosing a visit category. Our explainer on tourist and business visa categories covers the line.
  • Check the application window against the travel date. Each authority publishes its own. A Schengen application is lodged no more than six months and, as a rule, no later than 15 calendar days before the visit (EU Visa Code, Article 9). The earliest you can apply for a UK Standard Visitor visa is 3 months before travel (GOV.UK, Apply for a Standard Visitor visa). A trip approved a week before departure can fall outside the window altogether.
  • Approve the trip before any fee is paid. Name the approver. Application fees are set by each authority, so check its fee page for what happens to the fee if plans change.
  • Hold back on travel bookings. Follow the points in flight and hotel bookings for a visa: real reservations where the checklist asks for them, and, as our advice, nothing non-refundable before the decision.

Letters the company issues

  • One template for business travel, one for personal travel. For a business trip, the Visa Code's list of papers includes an invitation from the host firm and documents proving the applicant's employment status in the company (EU Visa Code, Annex II). The UK's guide describes an employer letter on headed paper giving role, salary and length of employment (GOV.UK, guide to supporting documents). What a complete letter contains is set out in our article on the employer NOC and leave letter.
  • Named signatories. List who may sign, and keep a copy of every letter with its date and reference number.
  • Who pays. If the company bears the cost, the letter says so plainly. If the host abroad pays for part, the host's invitation should say the same thing.
  • No favours. The company issues a business letter only for company business, and never backdates or rewords a letter to suit a form. A letter that misstates the purpose is a false statement in the employee's application, made in the company's name.
  • Request the host's invitation early. It is the paper the desk controls least.

While the application is open

  • One named contact at the desk for each traveller, and one place where the status is recorded.
  • The employee completes and signs their own form. The desk can prepare, but the declaration belongs to the applicant.
  • Diary time for the appointment. A Schengen applicant appears in person so that fingerprints can be collected (EU Visa Code, Article 10), and a UK applicant attends an appointment at a visa application centre.
  • Know where the passport is. Ask the mission or application centre whether it keeps the passport during processing. If it does, the employee cannot travel elsewhere in that period, so stagger back-to-back trips.

After the decision

  • Read the visa on the day it arrives. Check name, passport number, dates, entries and permitted stay against the trip, using visa validity and duration of stay as a guide. Update the visa register.
  • Track days for frequent travellers. Where a destination limits total days over a period, as the Schengen area does, someone should be counting.
  • Record refusals. A refusal has to be declared on later forms that ask about it, including personal applications the employee makes. Keep the notice, and decide in the policy who pays for a second application.
  • Return originals. The desk should not hold an employee's passport or personal papers longer than the application requires.

Personal trips by employees

Staff will ask for leave letters for holidays. Say in the policy how to request one, how many working days the desk needs, and who signs. Treat these requests as routine. The letter confirms employment and approved leave, and nothing more.

GoVisaX offers document checklists, online payment and application tracking. Companies can make an enquiry through the corporate travel page.

Sources

GoVisaX is a private visa facilitation service, not an embassy, consulate or government authority. Visa decisions rest solely with the issuing authority. Requirements change, so confirm the current rules with the official source before you apply.

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