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The interim government is taking an initiative to reduce the time needed for the acquisition of on-arrival visas for incoming overseas travellers through an app.
Home Advisor Jahangir Alam Chowdhury launched the app linked to the service on Thursday, reports bdnews24.com
“It takes around 45 minutes to an hour to receive on-arrival visas. If the system [app] that is being introduced takes effect, it will take them just 10 minutes to get on-arrival visas,” he said.
After they provide information online and assuming all documents are in order, applicants will receive a code, Jahangir said.
Once they arrive in Bangladesh. the applicants will receive visas by using the code and completing the dollar payments, he added.
“This will take 5-10 minutes depending on how long it takes the banks to process.”
He said the on-arrival visas would be available for 30 days while payment would be accepted by card and cash.
Jahangir mentioned that the on-arrival visas are applicable only for countries Bangladesh has contracts with, while permission from the home ministry will be required for other nations.
“To ease the acquisition of passports, we’re also thinking about excluding police verification and looking into how smooth the process can be made. We’ll try to entirely nullify the need for police verification,” he said.
On how long it might take to decide on the verification requirement, he said: “We can’t say that it will happen immediately, you’ll have to give it some time.”