Walk-in services for visa, other matters at BLS Centres in Canada from February 1

THE Indian High Commission in Ottawa announced on Tuesday that in order to facilitate better delivery of visa and consular services, it has been decided to start walk-in services at all BLS centres in Canada with effect from February 1.

All applicants seeking a visa, OCI (Overseas Citizenship of India), passport and other consular services can use the walk-in mode to submit their applications and supporting documents with BLS centres without a prior appointment. The appointment and postal modes will also remain available, according to a press release.

Depending on the resources available at each centre and the total number of daily appointments already booked, only a limited number of such walk-in applicants will be served each working day from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.

BLS centres will issue tokens to all walk-in applicants who can be served the same day within 30 minutes of their arrival. In case you are not issued a token within 30 minutes of your arrival, you may opt to come back at a later date or book an alternate mode of submission of your application and supporting documents. Only applications which are complete in all respects will be accepted at the BLS centres.

Those who have already booked appointments for submission of their applications and would now like to use the walk-in facility are requested to cancel their appointment slots once their applications are accepted so that these become available to others.