Visa and documentation for Polish to US.

ben101

I am looking for some info as i amthinking of going to Florida later in the year.
We are a family of 4, two adults and two under 18.
I've been several times but this year we were thinking of bringing our daughters best friend.She will be 17 and carries a polish passport.
I was just wondering what documentation do i need from her parents?
What kind of visa will she need as i believe its not as straight forward as with an Irish passport?
I know Obama has Poland earmarked to join the visa waiver programme but i haven't heard anything definite on that yet.
The US embassy don't seem to take enquiries by email so any info would be greatly appreciated:)

coylemj

She will need a non-immigrant visa...

http://poland.usembassy.gov/visas/nonimmigrant-visas.html

ben101

coylemj wrote: »

She will need a non-immigrant visa...

http://poland.usembassy.gov/visas/nonimmigrant-visas.html

Thanks,seems they charge $160:eek: ,that doesn't seem fair to charge some people in the EU visa fees and not others,oh well !!!!

coylemj

ben101 wrote: »

Thanks,seems they charge $160:eek: ,that doesn't seem fair to charge some people in the EU visa fees and not others,oh well !!!!

They don't treat all EU countries the same. We get in via the Visa Waiver Program (VWP) because we lobbied successfully for that concession for many years and in the days of the Celtic Tiger, the rejection rate for visa applications from Irish passport holders reached a level below the threshold which is required for a country to be admitted to the VWP. Poland is probably in the same boat as Ireland was 15 or 20 years ago.

The admin charge is probably a sign of the times, the State Dept. is probably strapped for cash so has been forced to make the consular sections in each embassy self-funding so your Polish friend will be paying for the paper pushers who handle her visa application.

ben101

Looks like poland will be getting added to VWP but no exact date when.You were right about the rejection % being high but it looks like they will get a pass because its a bit of an anomaly for Poland having such a high rejection rating as their rate of violating visa conditions are very low,something like 2%,much lower than most countries.

coylemj

ben101 wrote: »

Looks like poland will be getting added to VWP but no exact date when.You were right about the rejection % being high but it looks like they will get a pass because its a bit of an anomaly for Poland having such a high rejection rating as their rate of violating visa conditions are very low,something like 2%,much lower than most countries.

I wouldn't see that as an 'anomaly' at all. A high rejection rate for visa applications means that they are implementing an aggressive approval policy so it would be to be expected that the few people who are approved would have a low violation rate.

And vice versa: the more lax the approval process, the more violations you'd expect.