"how can you help a person to get a visa to come in your country"
This document has been made for the French case, which I know. There must be common points and differences from one country to another.
Important Preliminary Notice : time and material
Getting a visa can take time. It is thus necessary to start the process the earliest you can. Concerning the meetings, which gather people from varied countries, you have to start even more in advance. When you organize an "international" event, think well, when you fix the dates, that it will take very long time for people to receive the invitation, to decide to come, to arrange their journey, to ask for assistance for a visa...
Then, people can wait for weeks until they obtain an appointment and a visa, especially in summer, but that depends on the countries. Moreover, if you are in charge of getting several visas for an event, keep in mind that : it is lot of work full of unexpected events and it is necessary that the person in charge is very available, because there are often things to make at the last minute. Also keep in mind that the exchanges will be made in a foreign language perhaps not perfectly spoken by each participants, so many misunderstandings have to be forecasted. In addition, it is necessary to plan material to communicate by e-mail, fax and international phone calls. If there is available material, it is immediately much easier... If not, find an appropriate Internet Cafe, much less expensive and more effective than the Post office. Such expenses have to be planned.
The INVITATION LETTER
According to the country where they live and their nationality, people who want to come to travel abroad must request or not a visa from the embassy of Germany of their country.
A tourist visa lasts three months. To obtain such a visa, the demander can be asked to prove that he has financial means to cover his expenses of lodging, food and travelling back to his country. Nice!
One of the means to obtain a visa is to be invited by an association. In this respect the person who manages the visas for participants has to be part of an association which will invite these people. You can be simply member of an association but it will seem perhaps more logical to the employees of the embassies than it is a member of the board which is in charge of the invitations.
This association must be legally registered. It appeared that some embassies check wether the inviting associations really exist. There is no need of having a big, rich and recognized association to send invitations for visas. An association with a 'serious name' is sufficient. It must send a beautiful letter to the embassy, where the visa will be demanded. This letter is decisive. Take a headed paper with the name of your association and ask for final read-through (be carefull to grammatic forms).
The letter must:
* briefly present the association and the reasons why you invite this person (cultural meetings, congress, workshops, artistic exchanges, etc),
* precise periode during which this person is invited,
* precise identity of the person: name, first name, date, city and country of birth, number and date of delivery and end of validity of his passport, and current residence address,
* specify that the expenses of lodging, food and travelling of your guest will be covered by your association, and that the association or one of its members will lodge your guest
* ask your guest if he has an insurance for this trip (having a travel insurance can be compulsory to get a visa). If not you must specify in the letter that you will also cover medical expenses,
* show the original and (not photocopied) stamp of your association
* show the original signature of the member of the association who sends the invitation.
* Give the way to contact you easily: some nice employees of embassies will contact you directly if there are a problem or questions. The others will only say to your guest that some papers or information are missing and that he has to start again the all process.
(You will find an example of letter hereafter)
Be carefull, if anything is missing on the invitation, you might have to start again the all process. In certain cases, the embassy or your guest can require another letter specifying and justifying the reasons of the invitation.
SENDING the INVITATION, AND FOLLOWING The DELIVERY OF The VISA
In the majority of the cases, embassies require an original of the invitation letter. The best is to send 2 exemplars of the letter directly to your guest by the Post office.
Be carefull, according to country, that can take time, and sometimes postmails are lost! It is probably better to send the letter in registered post, even if it is a little more expensive, even with acknowledgement of delivery. Do not dream: mailings through companies like DHL or UPS are very expensive. It is worth to start the sendings in advance. Meanwhile, send a copy of the letter by fax to the embassy. Contacting embassy by e-mail is not sure. However it appeared that e-mails are not very appreciated by embassies (it is a too easy way to get a visa!).
The best is to telephone to the embassy:
* to ask whether the fax was received,
* to ask when the request will be treated,
* to mean to them that it is an urgent and very important request for your association, etc.
If the embassy employees are directly in contact with you, that can speed up the process. Pay attention to opening times during which you can reach by phone the embassies. Sometimes they are very short, and inform you about the time shift. It is sometimes very difficult to join the embassies, even completely impossible, then good luck! Preciously keep a copy of the letter, and all traces of every document you sent. Note the dates of sendings and receiving, because if you treat several requests at the same time you are likely to get lost. Keep in contact with your guest. Do not forget that it is probably much more easier for you to telephone or send e-mail than for him.
EXAMPLE OF INVITATION LETTER:
(Nice headed paper, logos...)
Name of the Association
Contact Person
address
telephone of the contact person
fax
mail
To the attention of Mister or Madam the Ambassador, (or Office of the
visas).
Embassy of Germany
Address
Place, date,
Madam, Sir,
Association (Name of your association) invites: Miss Samira INVITED, borned the 01.01.70 in Bejaia, Algeria, holder of the passport number... (delivered the.... and valid until...), and leaving 3 rue Didouch, 19800 Alger to take part to the international meeting organized by our association: presentation of cultural and artistic projects, meetings and exchanges multicultural (to add topics or precise details if you want).
We invite Miss Samira INVITED, as a member of the religious organization Bidule (or "to present an exposure of photography", or "to collaborate to our workshop on agriculture", etc).
Moreover Samira INVITED will help us with the preparation of the meeting, and will stay after the meeting to develop the projects decided during the meeting.
The duration of her presence in Germany will be from August 18th. 2007 to November 18th 2007 included, that is to say 90 days.
Association (Name of your association) commit itself to cover Miss Samira INVITED's expenses of lodging, food and travelling, (as well as possible medical expenses) during her stay in Germany. Moreover Association (Name of your association) can offer Miss Samira INVITED a lodging during her staying in Germany.
For association (Name of your association) Elmira HOST, secretary. (stamp and signature)