Saudi Arabia approves high-tech e-visa facility

Saudi Arabia Wednesday approved its new high-technology e-visa facility for visit and transit visas after its development was confirmed earlier this month.

The technology has been approved during a cabinet meeting headed by Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.

Through this development in the Kingdom’s visa issuance procedure, e-visa will be issued with a quick response (QR) code that will easily read all the data. The technology's arrival will now let go of the visa sticker on passports.

Earlier this month, the Saudi ministry of foreign affairs had launched the initiative as part of the digitisation of the Kingdom’s consular services which included visit visas, work permits and residence, the Saudi Press Agency reported.

The process will automate and improve quality of consular service for the Kingdom's visa seekers.

The new procedure, at the first stage, was activated throughout Saudi missions in India, United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Egypt, Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines.

"Last year, the ministry announced a mechanism for obtaining a “personal visit” visa, which enables visitors to enter the Kingdom to visit friends or acquaintances who are Saudi citizens," Arab News reported earlier.

Through this visa, visitors were also allowed to travel across the Kingdom including the permission to perform Umrah, and visit Makkah and Madinah as well as other religious and historical place. The visa also permitted attending cultural events in the country.

Using the visa platform website, the ministry allowed people to apply for the visa via convenient and easy electronic steps.

"Saudi citizens can invite friends to visit Saudi Arabia and perform Umrah by submitting a request for a personal visit on the visa platform and applying for a 'visit' request, by logging in through the unified national access platform, and filling out the data for the invitees," Arab News mentioned in its report.