The United Kingdom has inaugurated a new visa application centre in Beijing on 23rd April, Wednesday. It is being said that it is one of its largest investments by the UK as for as investments in visa centers go (or, are concerned). This move is being seen as recognition by the UK that the country (UK) is now a major tourist attraction. The new centre is double in size, has enhanced capacity, and on the whole, these changes it is expected will reduce the waiting times of visa applicants.
Actually and in fact, all of the 12 UK's visa centers in China have been upgraded, expanded and refurbished in preparedness of another busy year of visa applications that are expected to be received in 2014 and also beyond that.
Just last year, the U.K. had witnessed a largest ever number of visa applications from Chinese nationals, which increased by 31% from the previous year. The interest and growth/increase in tourist visas was even higher, and stood at 39%.
In a statement, the UK’s minister of culture stated his country was closely monitoring the rising interest and demand among the Chinese for visiting UK and that is why its visa processing centres in China were being accordingly improved and enhanced.
In 2013, the UK handled more than 380,000 applications from the citizens of China out of which 96% were accepted/successful.
The UK has additional visa processing centres in Shenzhen, Chengdu, Fuzhou, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Jinan, Chongqing, Shanghai, Shenyang, Guangzhou and Wuhan.
