Visiting relatives - help please with visa application

[Annette]

Hallo everyone - I wonder if anyone can help me with the following: My mother has just bought her ticket to come and visit us over Christmas. Now she has to apply for the visitor's visa and the travel agent has asked us to write a letter to invite her over. Does anyone know what exactly needs to be in this letter? I hope they don't want bank statements as well because we are very, very "platsak" and I haven't found work yet, so our income is not too great ...

Any advice at all?

Thanks ....

PS: Hoe simpel (en vals) gaan dit wees om vir my Ma in Engels te moet skryf!

[Ajay]

Hi Annette,

My sister is also applying for her visa and also needed the letter of invitation. Here's what I wrote:

Dear Maureen,

As per our recent discussions, I would love for you to come to Australia for a visit in June and to stay with Simon and I here in Sydney. The dates that work for me and that you have indicated are best for you are for you to depart South Africa on 14 June and return again on 29 June. This gives us enough time to see all the Top 10 sites and to get in some decent shopping hours too!

Looking forward to seeing you then!!

Regards

Ajay

Hope that helps!

AJay

[Guest colton]

The previous visit I did to australia with my mother we also had to get a letter to invite us over. I think it is because of all the illegal immigrants. We went over on that visit for my brothers wedding and so we had to attach an invitation to the wedding plus a letter stating that my brother was inviting us to come and stay with him for the period ....... to ............ Bank details etc. are not needed.

You basically have to state why you invited her and how long she is going to stay and where she is going to be staying.

Enjoy the visit

[Lmari]

Ek moes dieselfde doen toe my pa 5 jaar terug hier kom kuier het. Ons is gevra om in die brief te se

dat ons na hom sal omsien gedurende tyd, ingeval iets sou gebeur.

Groete

L'mari

[Lindy-Lee]

We just did invites for my brother-in-law and mom-in-law for their visa to vist June/July. We decided to put as much info as possible for safety sake in it.

full names and pass port numbers (theirs and hubby's)

what relationship with us (mother, brother etc...)

approx dates of visits (JUne/July)

reason for visit

that we will supply accomdation and meals

our address

where hubby employed and for how long

We worked through Harvey World Travel (in CT) they charged us R500 which included all fees, courier fees to PTA. They had all the visa app forms and help mom to fill in everything...and we had visa approval with in 2 or 3 days. we emailed bank statements and invite directly to HWT. mom just took her passport and 1 foto for visa along.

We were very impressed with their service.

Good luck, hope you get it all sorted.

Lindy-Lee

[Annette]

Thank you everyone for your help! Now I'm going to have to pretend that we invited her and not that she invited herself, actually ...

[Shandell]

Annette

My dad has visited us before and we had to send a letter for 3 months stay, now he wants to apply for a longer visa (6 months) and we have to send a letter and bank statements. All that the letter needs to say is that you invite them to come and visit you and they will stay with you during that period.

Good luck

Shandell

[Annette]

Hi everyone, me again! Sorry, one more question: can this letter me emailed, or does it have to be a signed letter by snail-mail.

[Guest Larry]

Annette, when I invited my uncle across from SA over 5 years ago, I was told that it had to be signed. They accepted a facsimile copy. (ie A fax is OK).

Things might have changed and maybe they accept emails. Why not phone and ask?

I included as many contact details for me as possible.... Just in case the Australian embassy wanted to contact me to verify that the invitation was genuine.

After that, there were no problems.

Edited June 3, 2006 by Larry

[Dedrei]

If I can just add a question to this thread - don't mean to hijack it.

How do you pay/book for tickets for family from this side? Who do you use and how does it work?

[Guest Larry]

The only times that I have done that, I have just passed on my credit card details to the person overseas or booked tickets online and paid for them by credit card.

[Lindy-Lee]

The invite...we just type the letter in word, printed it, signed it, scan it, e-mailed it to travel agent.

Buying ticket this side...we did some research an found that it actually worked out cheaper buying it in SA I know hard to believe. But if you want to it that way the best would be (IMO) to do it over the internet and family member can pick up ticket from airport or travel agent as far as I know.

If you are sending (emailing) bank statements , they must be certified by bank or can be done at any post office (just take originals with you and proof of identity)

Good luck with all your visas

Only 19 more days for my 1st guest to arrive

Lindy-Lee

[Cindylou]

When we did our tourist visa applications in Aug 2005 we were allowed to use an emailed invitation. The visas in SA are handled by vfs and they have detailed checklists for different categories of visitors. Check it out http://www.vfs-au.co.za/checklist.html

Cindylou

[Pisces]

My mom's coming over now in June/July and again Dec/Jan so we also got a long stay visa for her (6 months) all we did was to send a postcard inviting her over for the two dates. We had to send snailmail as VFS wanted to see the Australian stamp. It took 2 weeks to get there, other than that we have had no problems.

[Annette]

Dankie weer almal!

Cindylou, that link is great - exactly what I need.

[Riekie]

We booked flights for someone visiting from RSA from studentflights in Aus (you don't have to be a student to buy your tickets there) and we saved $400 on the price we would have paid if we booked from RSA. They issue an email ticket, so there's no having to pick up or send tickets anywhere.

We emailed our invitations to all our visitors so far, and all were accepted.