The Office for IT and eGovernment presented a new service, eKonzulat, through which foreigners who come to Serbia for employment can apply for a type D visa, for a longer stay of up to 180 days.
As soon as the foreigner applies for visa D, he receives the ID number of his application and the employer who intends to employ him can submit a request for a work permit to the National Employment Service so that the procedures for issuing visas and issuing work permits are conducted at the same time.
When he obtains a D visa on the basis of employment, upon arrival in Serbia for the period for which it was granted, a foreigner does not have to submit a request for temporary residence, because a visa D on the basis of employment means that he has a regulated stay in our country.
In that case, the employer who intends to hire him applies only for a work permit.
In the event that he remains to work in Serbia even after 180 days, the foreigner who has been granted a D visa submits a request for temporary residence.
“Users of eKonzulat will be, first of all, citizens of Asian countries (China, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal), as well as citizens of Turkey, Russia, Ukraine, Egypt, who come in large numbers to work on infrastructure projects in Serbia,” it is stated in a statement.
The procedure of online application for a type D visa, for a longer stay of up to 180 days, in the first phase will be only on the basis of employment and applies to all foreigners who come to Serbia with the intention of employment.
In the next phase of the application development, it is expected that other types of visas will be applied for electronically (on the basis of education, family reunification, real estate ownership, treatment and medical care).
Procedure for obtaining a type D visa
Through eKonzulat, the user creates an account on the National Portal for Electronic Identification (eid.gov.rs), which makes him an eCitizen and initiates the submission of requests by filling out the request form itself.
Applying is done in four steps:
– Personal data related to the person applying, family data, if any, and employment data are filled in.
– Travel test data.
– Visa data (DKP is chosen to which the user applies, for now he can apply only for visa D based on the intention to be employed), data on previous stays in RS, if any, data on intended future residence in RS (address in RS).
– Adding accompanying documentation – in addition to the photo, passport, invitation letter, the user is obliged to attach other documents required by the DCM. Also in this last step, the user receives an instruction to pay the visa application processing fee, so the DCM does not take the request into consideration until the payment is recorded – the payment does not go through the system but the users only receive payment instructions.
After the request is submitted by the user and the payment for the submitted request is recorded, the DCM takes over the request in its VIS where it further processes the request and changes the status of the request by notifying the party by e-mail (any change of status initiates sending e-mail to the user).
DKP has the ability to change the status of the request, but also to send the user a comment, request a supplement to the request and send an attachment.
After the user has been approved, the user must appear at the DCM in order for his visa to be registered in his passport, Nova Ekonomija reports.
