Qatar Visa Centers abroad to cover domestic workers soon

Middle East News

Qatar Visa Centers abroad to cover domestic workers soon

The newly-recruited domestic workers, including housemaids and drivers, will soon be able to avail the services offered by Qatar Visa Centers (QVC) opened by the Ministry of Interior at major workforce exporting countries, said a senior official.

“We will soon add newly recruited domestic helps and employees of the public sector in the list of those eligible to complete their visa procedures at QVC,” said Director of the Visa Support Services Department at the Ministry of Interior, Major Abdullah Khalifa Al Mohannadi.

Speaking at a programme of Al Rayan TV recently, Al Mohannadi said that Qatar Visa Centers, in phase 1, focused on the workforce of the private sector then after a while semi-government sector was added.

“Currently, only work visas are being processed at QVS, but in the next phases visas for other purposes like family visits will be added,” said Al Mohannadi.

He said that Qatar Visa Centers have processed over 30,000 visas since their establishments.

As per the plan, QVCs will cover eight countries through the establishment of 20 centres, in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Nepal, the Philippines, Tunisia, Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh. So far, 13 Qatar Visa Centers have been opened in five countries.

These centres provide facilities for those who have initial approval for entry visas to the State of Qatar where they can complete the registration of their biometrics, medical examinations and the signing of contracts electronically through a unified channel, and thus saving time and effort.

A Visa Center was opened in Kathmandu, Republic of Nepal, at the end of last month, as part of the ‘Qatar Visa Centers Program’, to facilitate and streamline procedures for bringing expatriates to the country.

Nepal is the fifth country where a Visa Center was open after Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan and India — which have proved to be a great success in providing premium, simplified and more advanced services.

One of the major benefits of QVC is that they provide an opportunity to workers to get detailed information about their work contracts in their own languages including salaries, vacations, incentives and allowances before they leave their countries to Doha.

The project is being implemented in cooperation between the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Administrative Development, Labour and Social Affairs, the Ministry of Public Health and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.