How to: Apply Family Visit Visa – Part 1

1. Go to visa.mofa.gov.sa, change the language of you choice (“English” or “France” or stay with Arabic), and select the ‘Family visiting visa request’ option, and proceed to fill-up the online form. You may need help from your Saudi/Arab friend as the form is in Arabic, even though you already select “English” mode for the web site. (Tips: Use Internet Explorer to access this web site. Using other web browser such as Mozilla Firefox may giving you difficulties; the form will not showing up properly and some drop down menus/text boxes may not responding correctly)

Note: Depending on your company policy, they may do this for you. Like my case, they did for me, but they made a spelling mistake on the visitor name (the only part where you have to fill in Roman character as per passport, the rest are in Arabic). So, I need to do it again on my own (well, with assistance from my friend, of course).

The information needed to fill up the form as below:

This is the ‘translated’ form that you need to fill-in. The form is actually in Arabic, I showed it here for you to get the idea of what information needed to complete it.

2. After filling up and confirmed, you will get the page where it is ready to be printed. Print it, and give it to your company to have it stamped with company stamp.

3. Next step is to get the Chamber of Commerce (CoC) stamp/sticker. You may want to go personally to the CoC (and go thru all the adventures moment there), or ask someone to go there, or if you know anyone in you company (usually the Visa department section, if your company have one) have an online account for the CoC, then he might be able to do it for you. You need to pay SAR25 for this per form regardless of which option you choose, unless if your company paid it for you.

If you decided to go there personally, there are 2 CoC office that I know, this are the GPS coordinates:

• Near Khurais road: xxxx.xxxx N, xxx.xxx S
• Near Al-Rowad International School (English section): xxx.xxx N, xx,xxx S

If you have someone do it for you online, you will not get a sticker, but you will get a confirmation letter/receipt which need to be printed. You need to make sure that the application number is entered correctly if using online option, if not your CoC payment is invalid. The application number is shown at the top left of the form which written (رقم الطلب).

Note: Please remember this number. Its good to written it somewhere or make a copy of the form. You will need it later.

4. Now, get your other supporting documents ready:

• Copy of your Iqama
• Copy of your Wife and kids iqama
• Copy of your parents/parents in law/family member passport

And clipped it together with the Application form + CoC proof of payment (sticker or form)

5. Once done, please proceed to the MOFA (Ministry of Foreign Office) building located at Nassriyah Road. If you go by car, you can park the car at the designated parking area for MOFA visitor, which is outside of the MOFA building area. It may be quite confusing to find it, its best if you have GPS. If not, you will notice many people walking from/to that area. You need to walk thru traffic lights and quite dangerous busy road to go to MOFA building from the parking lot.

• GPS coodinate for MOFA: xxx.xxxx N, xxxx.xxxx S
• GPS coordinate for MOFA visitor parking: xxx.xxx N, xxx.xxx S

Follow the crowds, and you will surely find the correct place to submit your application which located in the ground floor, insyaAllah.

You need to go thru the security checks before entering the building. You need to take out keys, purse, mobile phone and the likes to go thru the metal detector. You will also need to show your original Iqama to the security guard before he allowed you to enter.

Note: They’re using the queue numbering system, similar to what we usually have in banks or government and private offices in Malaysia.

Tips: Once you enter the building, directly go the 1st counter to get the queue number. There are a lot of people there, and the people are keep coming. 5 minutes could make a lot of different, you may get 10 numbers later or more. Know where you want to go, and aim it directly.

I being informed that they closed the counter 1 (for disbursing the numbers) by 12.00 noon. But when I was there on January 8, 2010, they still open it even after the Dhzuhr prayer. Even after I left at about 1.30 pm, they’re still disbursing the number. The last number I saw was 500 something.

6. Now, wait for your number to be call. Depending on your situations and luck, you could easily spent you time there 2-3 hours. For my case, I reached there at about 10.50 am, get the number 381. And my number showed up at 1.30 pm.

7. The officer will make a quick check on your application form. You need to give them your original Iqama. They will verify the information, check your supporting documents, make some scribbling and .. “khalas… bla bla bla ..” – some Arabic words that I do not clearly heard.

8. Then, you can smile now and feel relief because you already finised the most difficult part, waiting. Please quickly rushed to your office as you’re using your working time for this matter, and try to replace the time by working until late today….

9. While working late, you can again go to visa.mofa.gov.sa to check the application status. Usually you will get to know the result on the same day, in the afternoon of course, may be around 4pm. You will need to enter the application number (thats why you need to keep a copy of it) and your Iqama number to check. Once you get the approval, sent it to your counterparts in Malaysia to do the 2nd part of this lengthy process. But at least, your parents are one step closer to Saudi.

Good luck.