BACKGROUND:
I will write my experiences of obtaining a national visa for Germany. Since I was in my last leg of my PhD, I started applying for jobs and postdoc opportunities well in advance. I had to submit my PhD thesis in August and I got an interview call from German Institute in May. They confirmed the job in June and said that they will send the offer letter soon. I got the offer letter by the end of July.
As I didn't do much research on german visa before receiving offer letter, I thought it would be any easy task to get an appointment. But I was wrong.
So guys as soon as you get a hint that you may go to Germany, just book a visa appointment at your respective German consulate. I waited unnecessarily till July end and then looked into the appointment website.
BOOKING an APPOINTMENT:
I belong to Bangalore and fortunately the German Consulate is in Bangalore itself. People from other places in Karnataka and Kerala had to travel to Bangalore. The first time I opened the booking portal, it said "No appointments available" till October, My joining was in November. I just googled how to book an appointment. People had mentioned to book at 3.30 AM. So the next morning I tried to book by entering all the details, but till then all the appointments were gone. I tried booking the cancelled slots at 3.45 AM, that was even more difficult. So i read that using an autofill option in browser will be useful. So I setup the autofill and tested it in Schengen visa portal. For the next 2 days I tried at 3.45 AM, no success. Then I thought let me book any dates which I get. So I booked an appointment of Oct 24th, but then I thought of I try more, I can get an earlier date. Because I was worried about my joining date being November. So in Bangalore Consulate, there is no option of changing the date, we need to cancel and book another appointment. Once we cancel, the passport number is blocked for one day, you can only book your appointment the day after. So after canceling my appointment, I practiced in Schengen portal to complete the whole process in just 8 seconds, staring from captcha entering to final submission. You can hit enter instead of clicking on the Submit button which makes the process faster. So after practice, the next day I opened the National Visa portal at 3.40, waited till it is 3.44, heartbeats were at the peak. Exactly at 3.45, started refreshing the page, after about 20 seconds, the appointments appear. I made sure, I refreshed the page by moving between August and September months. Once I clicked September, 4 to 5 dates appeared, I selected the second date since many people would prefer to click the first option, so chances are less for that. I didn't even see the date, just clicked the second date link and the time in the next page. Next was the autofilled page, just copy paste your passport number, have it copied in the clipboard beforehand. Then I entered the captcha and hit ENTER.. And VOILA!!! The appointment is confirmed on 5th September.
The heartbeats came to normal after 5 min. I followed the same procedure for booking appointment of my wife on 12th September.
DOCUMENTS for RESEARCHER VISA:
The documents I took were : offer letter, Passport, my degree certificates, application form and declaration forms, 3 photographs, Cover letter (mention your date of travel, place of stay if booked, source of income, if family accompanying etc), Demand draft, other supporting documents. Make sure to carry 2 photocopies of each. It is better to fill the application and declaration forms in aoftcopy and then take a print. Also carry blank forms 2 copies, in case something needs to be changed at last moment there. Do not staple any documents.
In the demand draft it is sufficient to mention payee as "German Consulate General, Bangalore", the longer version does not fit in the DD. Cover letter should be crisp and only important points, don't beat around the bush.
For my wife, the same documents of mine, her application form and marriage certificate. No need to any apostille as it is not necessary and they don't care about Indian apostille. They have their own verifying system.
VISA APPOINTMENT:
My appointment was scheduled at 8.45, so reached there at 8.20. The security guy asked all the visitors to go to upper floor and wait. Only applicants were allowed inside after verifying the passport number, no mobiles allowed. Keep mobiles at security or give it to visitor. So they have me a window number and I went in and sat in front of the window. At 9.15 am the window opened, the guy before me had insufficient documents and wanted to change appointment date, but they said they cannot help it, he needs to rebook. The officer at the window called my name, he looked like a mallu guy. He asked what kind of visa, I said researcher visa, asked for documents, i gave the whole bundle of first set of documents. He just verified all of them, then asked for DD. He then asked few questions like When and where are you going in Germany, what is your research about, etc etc. Then took my fingerprints. One important thing they ask is the intended date of travel, I said October since my contract mentioned that formally I have to join in October. So they will try to maje sure they will update your visa status before that. He then kept my degree certificate and passport with him and gave an acknowledgement slip.
The same process for my wife, they kept the marriage certificate and her passport.
Since it was a researcher visa, Neither I had mandatory German language requirement nor my wife had.
WAITING TIME:
After about 2 weeks, by mid September, I got a mail from visa office asking to fill a questionnaire. It contained questions regarding my research work, will my wife accompany me, staying address (which I had not booked and mentioned the same). I sent the responses next day and he replied saying that they will do a background check which takes 4 weeks and hopefully by mid September, they may update reg visa. He also asked me to postpone my joining date. I anyway was planning to travel in Nov, so i said to him that the Institute has agreed for joining in Nov.
After 3 days, my Prof in Germany recieved a similar questionnaire and he answered along the lines of my responses.
After 1 week, the same visa officer mailed me requesting for my wife's passport copy and short CV. I sent the same.
Then I waited till mid September, there were no updates till then. It was a frustrating period, everyday checking my inbox for the mail. Why would background check take so many days with all documents in place. Nobody ever knows!!
RECEIVING the VISA:
On 16th Sept evening, my wife got a call from German Consulate, the lady asked her what date she intends to travel, my wife mentioned 31st October. She said her to collect the passport day after tomorrow. I recieved a mail same day around 4 pm that my visa had been decided upon and to collect passport. So the next day both of us went to Consulate with the acknowledgement slip and my confirmation email printed. I mentioned the security that I got a mail but my wife only got a call. So he let me in for collecting both the passports. I just gave both the acknowledgement slips and they gave both the passports, stamped with German national visa.
My visa had a validity of 6 months and my wife's had 3 months validity. So the next process would be to travel to Germany and get my Blue card and extend my stay. I will write about it soon.
If aby questions please leave a comment, I'll answer as far as I know.
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