Effective January 1, 2008, the application fee for a U.S. non-immigrant visa will increase worldwide from BZ$200 (US$100) to BZ$262 (US$131). This fee increase allows the U.S. Department of State to recover the costs of security and other enhancements to the non-immigrant visa application process.
This worldwide increase applies both to non-immigrant visas issued on machine-readable foils in passports and to border crossing cards issued to certain applicants in Mexico. It is being implemented at all U.S. embassies and consulates.
Applicants who paid the prior BZ$200 (US$100) application fee before January 1 will have their applications processed only if they are scheduled and appear for a visa interview before January 31.
Applicants who paid the prior BZ$200 (US$100) application fee and appear for visa interviews after January 31, 2008, must pay the difference — BZ$62 (US$31) — before they will be interviewed.
The U.S. Department of State is required by law to recover the cost of processing non-immigrant visas through the collection of the Machine-Readable Visa application fee. Because of new security-related costs, new information technology systems, and inflation, the BZ$200 (US$100) Machine-Readable Visa fee is lower than the actual cost of processing non-immigrant visas.
In fact, the BZ$200 fee was already lower than the cost of processing non-immigrant visas when the fee was reviewed as a part of the cost of service study in 2004. The U.S. Government has been absorbing the additional cost since that time.
As of last week, U.S. Embassy Belmopan is now collecting 10 fingerprints from each applicant, and the cost charged by the FBI to review those fingerprints no longer allows us to do this.
The application fee has increased twice since 9/11, the last time in 2002.
-press release-