Our Terms and Conditions

Mobile Visa Service, 23 Ashlake Road, Streatham , London SW16 2BB
Telephone: 020 8769 1447      Mobile: 0795 192 3497

1. Who we are. Mobile Visa Service was established in 1996 as a sole proprietorship. It has traded continuously since 1996 and was incorporated at Companies House as a private limited company on 19 May 2003 with the name Mobile Visa Service Limited under Company No. 4765542. Its registered office is at the address of its accountants, Maurice J Bushell & Co, Well Court, 14-16 Farringdon Lane, London EC1R 3AU. (Please note that the registered office address does NOT accept passports or visa applications).

2. Our duty to you. We understand that your passport is your most important document and that it is natural to be concerned about it. We hope that by providing you with information about how we work that this will alleviate some of your concerns. Most of our business comes from repeat clients, personal recommendations from friends who have used our service or travel agencies and other visa companies. Therefore, it is important to us that you feel happy with the service and understand our methods of work. The purpose of using a visa service is to save you the time and stress of having to go through the process yourself. The staff at Mobile Visa Service Ltd. have more than 18 years of experience between them and we would not have remained in business if we were not competent and careful in our very responsible work.

3. What we do. Mobile Visa Service Ltd. will offer advice, provide information and visa application forms, arrange collection of documents from city offices and from Canary Wharf, and from Suite 416, 2 Old Brompton Road, SW7 3DQ (South Kensington tube) (where your documents may be left if you are outside our area of collection), receive documents by post and in person at our Ashlake Road office (by appointment), deliver documents to Embassies and collect documents from Embassies and return the same to clients when visas have been processed. Any enquiries should be directed to Mobile Visa Service Ltd on the above numbers. We collect documents daily from Old Brompton Road, but please note that this is a mail collection address only and staff at Old Brompton Road will not be able to assist with visa queries. During busy periods we may be unable to pick up and deliver from your offices and you may need to bring or post your application to one of our offices. This will apply to the two week period prior to public holidays or the Pampalona festival in Spain as we receive a high volume of applications. During these periods we will concentrate our efforts on processing all visas in time for travel before the holidays and, therefore, will be unable to offer the more personal service we can at other, less busy, times of the year. We appreciate your forbearance at these times.

4. Hours of trading 10.30 am to 5.30 pm Monday to Friday by appointment. Closed weekends and all public holidays.

5. After hours applications may be accepted by prior arrangement by dropping your completed application with all documents and full payment in an envelope through the letterbox at Mobile Visa Service, 23 Ashlake Road, Streatham, London SW16 2BB. Please mark the envelope "Mobile Visa Service". Please do not ring the bell or telephone us after hours. Please do not annoy other residential neighbours by ringing other bells and asking them to take your documents in. After hours applications are accepted as a favour only if you have made a prior arrangement with us during office hours. Please respect our staff and neighbours right to privacy. Misuse of the arrangement will result in us refusing to take applications after hours.
There is a mail flap in the door at Citibox, 2 Old Brompton Road, South Kensington where you may drop your documents at your own risk. Please put them in an envelope marked "Mobile Visa Service - Box 416" if you choose to use this option and let us know that you have done this. (If you do not put "Box 416" on your application it will not get to us.) We suggest you come between 9am and 6pm Monday to Friday or between 9am and 12noon on Saturdays and hand them to the receptionist for your own peace of mind.

6. Sending documents to us by post. Please do not post documents to us until you have received full information regarding requirements and prices. Documents should be sent only by Special Delivery Post (£4 minimum) using the Post Office’s pre-paid silver Special Delivery bags (smallest or second smallest size). For a small additional cost you can insure your documents for a higher amount which covers consequential loss, we strongly recommend you do this. If you require your documents to be returned by post it will be necessary to include a self-addressed return pre-paid Special Delivery bag with the necessary extra amount for consequential loss.

7. Changes in Regulations/Information. Mobile Visa Service Ltd. will endeavour to keep abreast of all new visa information and requirements for the Embassies which we handle regularly, however, from time to time Embassies may change their visa regulations/information and we cannot be responsible for any inconvenience or loss due to changes of which we are not aware.

8. Mobile Visa Service reserves the right to refuse to accept any application without giving a reason.

9. Our Service Charge. Mobile Visa Service Ltd.’s service charge to you for processing your visa will be quoted to you at the outset. This may change depending on the time of year. There is an additional charge for urgent applications, which we may accept at our discretion. Once we have accepted your application our service charge will not change unless we are unable to lodge your documents because we are still waiting for you to provide something and the time which it takes you to provide it means that your application will then have to be lodged during a busier period when we have a higher service charge normally or your application becomes an urgent application for which an additional fee is applicable. You will be advised if this is likely to occur.

10. Embassies’ Visa Fees. We cannot be responsible for any increase in Embassies’ visa fees, in such cases the client will have to cover the additional fee.

11. Additional work. Should additional work be required before we can lodge your visa application, for example to open passport pages, have a passport officially mended by your Embassy or cancel an existing visa or stamp you will be quoted for this separately and this will be in addition to our service charge for processing your visa.

12. Payment. Payment is necessary before we can process your application. When we collect from you or from Old Brompton Road visa fees must be paid in cash. Service charge may be paid by cheque with a valid cheque guarantee card, provided you have 10 days before you travel. Cheques may be accepted for postal applications to cover both visa fees and service charge provided you have 10 days before you travel. Documents will not be returned until cheques have cleared. If you have less than 10 days before your travel date, payment should be in cash only (applications collected from you personally or from Old Brompton Road) or postal orders (postal applications) which can be bought at the post office. Please make cheques & postal orders payable to Mobile Visa Service Ltd.

13. Cancellations. Should you decide to cancel your application after we have received and checked all documents and before the documents have been lodged at the Embassy a cancellation charge of £15 will apply. Applications cannot be cancelled and travel dates cannot be changed after documents have been lodged at the Embassy and the full service charge and visa fee will apply. It may be possible to withdraw a passport in a extreme emergency depending on the Embassy’s policy, however, visa fees and service charge will still apply. If you unable to supply any additional documents required by the Embassy on time after we have received and checked your application the application will be deemed to have been cancelled and a £15 administrative charge will apply. If the application has already been lodged in the Embassy the full service charge will apply.

14. Change of Travel Date. Should your travel date change after an application is lodged this will normally necessitate a new application being made, and a new visa fee and service charge being paid, except where the Embassy has issued a multiple entry visa in the first instance and the amended dates fall within the validity of that visa.

15. Information Required to Lodge Your Application. You will be provided with information detailing all visa requirements. The information is provided for your benefit and to give your visa the best possible chance of success, however, provision of all information requested does not guarantee a visa. The Embassy will decide whether to grant a visa. Occasionally the Embassy may request additional documents or that you should appear in person. It will be necessary to comply with these requests and you should, therefore, always allow sufficient time for your visa to be processed. We may, at our discretion, accept your instructions to lodge your documents without all of the information we have requested, however, our service charge will apply should the application be refused. (Visa fees are usually refundable, we will advise you of any exceptions, notably for France, USA and Netherlands). If you instruct us to lodge in such circumstances, we will give you our honest opinion of your chances.

16. Processing Times/Urgent Applications. You will be quoted a minimum processing time when you request information. This is for our benefit and your benefit, it allows for your documents to checked and lodged in an orderly manner and provided that you have provided all documents which we have requested at the outset and allowed sufficient time we will re-lodge your application where possible and without further charge should the Embassy request additional documents (except USA). The quoted processing times are a guide and may vary during busy periods. The quoted processing time will start from the time we receive all your documents correctly. We may, at our discretion, accept an application where a client has less than our quoted processing time but where there is sufficient time for the Embassy to process the visa. Where we do accept such an urgent application it will always be dependant upon the documents being supplied as requested at the time we accept the application. If documents are not in order or we have to wait for additional document(s) it may no longer be physically possible for us to lodge your application either because of our prior commitments to other clients or because of the Embassy’s minimum processing time. If this is the case you will be advised and we will return your documents to you. You may be able to apply in person in some cases. If we accept your urgent application we will do our best for you but we cannot take any responsibility for urgent applications. Clients should be aware that if they leave their application to the last minute there is a very great risk that if something does not go to plan then they will not receive their visa in time to travel. Among the many things that can go wrong are: Embassy not accepting your documents the first time, Embassy’s computer being down, Embassy changing processing times, a national holiday of which we are not aware resulting in the Embassy being shut for one or more days, Embassy strikes, transport strikes or delays, flooding, bomb scares, threat of terrorism, accidents or any other kinds of delays. Urgent applications where the client requires their passport back within 1 working day of the visa being processed incur an additional charge of £20.

17. Non-Urgent Applications. Visas will normally be processed in order of travel date and you will receive your visa in sufficient time to travel where your application is a non-urgent application.

18. If you need your passport back for other reasons. Please do not give us your passport and application if you need it back during the visa process for mortgage applications, national insurance number interviews, to buy travellers cheques or any other such reason. Unless this has been agreed upon with us beforehand, and where a faster service is required the appropriate fee for an urgent application has been paid, your documents will be processed in the normal manner and you will have to wait until we are able to return them. Please think about this before you give us your documents and rearrange any such appointments where necessary. Where a spouse or parent requires their passport back before your application is processed and where we are not processing a visa for them but need their passport in support of your visa application, you must inform us of this at the time we collect your documents in writing or when you post your documents in or leave them at Old Brompton Road, and let us know the date this is needed by. We will do our best to comply with your request if at all possible, either by leaving the documents at Old Brompton Road for you to collect from reception (valid ID will be needed), or at our office in Streatham, or by posting them to you by Special Delivery Post where you have provided us with a Special Delivery Envelope for this purpose (additional to one we would need for the normal return of your documents by Special Delivery). It may be possible, depending on our prior commitments, to deliver them back to you (in central London) upon payment of an additional £10 delivery charge. If a genuine medical/family emergency occurs during the processing time which requires your urgent travel to your home country please do not hesitate to contact us and we will do our very best to assist you.

19. Communication with you. We will check your documents when we pick them up from you. They will be checked again at our office. If we notice anything which we overlooked the first time we will contact you. We will check your documents when we receive them by post and provided you have given us contact numbers we will let you know either by phone or text message that we have received your documents and that they appear to be in order or inform you of anything else which may be needed. If you have posted your application and have not heard from us within 2 working days to say that we have received it please do call us. You will be given an approximate date of completion at the time we receive your documents, which, provided you have allowed enough time, will be well before your travel date. It will approximate to our minimum processing times on our visa information sheets. The minimum processing time starts from the time we have received all your documents completely and correctly. We will call you or send you a text message as soon as we hear anything from the Embassy, either if they have requested additional information or when your visa has been granted. It is not necessary to call us during this period unless there is a genuine emergency. If there is anything to discuss we will call you. Repeated telephone calls requesting updates on information or earlier completion dates greatly add to our stress and workload and distract us from the main tasks of tracking the passports which are going in and out of Embassies and of processing your visa application. We are aware of your travel dates and are processing applications in order of travel. Your passport will be delivered or posted back to you or to Old Brompton Road or to our Streatham office generally within 2 -3 days of us informing you that the Embassy has granted your visa and always in time for your travel, provided any cheques have cleared. We will inform you again the day we are able to deliver/post your passport and we will let you know when it is available for collection at Old Brompton Road or Streatham. Unless we are delivering the passport back to your offices, communication regarding completed applications will be by text message informing you that the visa has been granted and passport posted or available for collection at Old Brompton Road/Streatham. Please do not call us if you are not travelling urgently and have not paid an urgent fee between the time we let you know your visa is back and the time we call you to make an appointment to deliver it (normally within 2-3 working days). We greatly appreciate your patience and it assists us enormously during busy periods. If you cannot wait, you may request to collect your passport from Old Brompton Road or from Mobile Visa Service Ltd in Streatham. Your passport will be posted back to you (if a postal application) usually within one working day of us receiving it back from the Embassy, provided cheques have cleared. We will inform you when we expect to be posting your passport back. If you have not received your passport back within 3 working days of your travel date, and if you have not heard anything from us or we have not advised you that it will be completed within this 3 day period, please DO call us. We can only communicate directly with the person for whom we are processing the visa. It is your responsibility to ensure that the telephone numbers you have given us are correct and messages will be checked by yourself regularly. Please maintain sufficient credit on your mobile and arrange to have it receive voice and text messages should you have it switched off for any reason. (There appears to be a particular problem with Vodaphone not going on to a voice message when switched off, please ensure your phone accepts voice and text messages.) If any of your numbers change for any reason please inform us in writing.

20. Future communication with you. Mobile Visa Service will retain your details and may contact you in the future with information regarding visas. (If you do not wish to be contacted please indicate this on your Client Contact Information sheet at the time you apply.) We will not pass on your details to any third parties.

21. How we keep track of your documents. Your documents and application are checked when we receive them. All passports will have our sticker placed on the back, with our company’s name, address and telephone number on it. This will include any old/cancelled passports and spouse’s/parent’s passports submitted in support of your visa application. All the passports will have a sticky white square placed in the upper right hand corner of the front cover. This will have the following information recorded on it: the visa you are applying for, the job number, the travel date (where this is soon we will write it in red so that we can quickly identify urgent applications), how the passport will be returned and any money you still owe us or we owe you. The job number will correspond to a numbered, colour-coded, plastic zip-up bag. All your documents will be placed in your individual, numbered zip-up bag, so that they are at all times together and protected. We have different coloured bags for each Embassy we lodge at, so that we can quickly see at a glance what Embassies documents are for. In addition, in many Embassies we lodge passports with our agency’s tag stapled to the top, which will have our agency’s name and address on it or a unique agency number (US visas). After we have checked and tagged your documents they are entered in our book under the date in which they come in. The details we record are the bag number, surname, initial, passport nationality, visa required, fees paid, date received, date lodged in Embassy, date back from Embassy, date returned to client. The passports are recorded in our diary under Embassy headings on the day in which they are lodged at the Embassy. We then record them in red in the diary under date the Embassy has given us for collection.

22. What we do to safeguard your documents. We believe we have a responsibility to safeguard your documents whilst they are in our possession and we take this responsibility very seriously. Our premises at Streatham is fitted with an ADT alarm, fire alarm and CO2 detector. The alarm is monitored and police/fire brigade notified automatically if it is activated. In addition, your documents are stored in a fire proof safe. We have agreed policies about how documents should be carried in bags and how bags should be safeguarded whilst your documents are in transit around London. We will never leave a bag unattended. Where Embassy queues necessitate us queuing during the night or starting at very early hours, especially before it is light, passports will be carried separately in a money belt. However, as we are travelling around London on public transport there remains a small risk whilst documents are in transit, the same as if you are carrying your documents to the Embassy or to or from your place of work or residence yourself, and you understand that this risk exists and agree to indemnify us against it. We accept no responsibility for any loss/damage or delay arising when documents are in the possession of an Embassy, the post office or an outside company. Should anything unforeseen occur we will do our best to help you and to remedy the situation as far as is possible. However, we do not accept responsibility for loss howsoever arising, unless that loss occurs directly because of our wilful negligence, and it remains your responsibility at all times to ensure that either you have adequate travel insurance (which should start from the day you pay for your trip and not from the day you actually travel) or that all travel and accommodation is fully refundable in the event of any unforeseen occurrence. Our responsibility is limited at all times only to your passport and visa when these are in our direct possession and we cannot accept responsibility for loss or delay to your travel arrangements or accommodation or any claims for consequential loss (such as loss of earnings, etc.) whatsoever or howsoever arising. We do not accept responsibility for an Embassy refusing a visa or not processing it on time, particularly where you have allowed insufficient time or not supplied the documents requested on time. If we have accepted your application and the documents appear to be correct and the Embassy refuses to grant you the visa, provided that we have not warned you previously that your documents were not acceptable or there is no matter which you should have disclosed to us but did not, we will refund the visa fee (except France and Australia where Embassy charges fee for lodging rather than issuance of visa) and our service charge. We reserve the right to charge a £15 admin fee in such circumstances. It will be your responsibility to cancel your travel arrangements or to apply again in person where possible.

23. Disclosure. You must disclose all relevant matters to us before we collect your documents. This includes but is not limited to, previous misuse of a visa (particularly obtaining a visa from one Schengen state but not travelling to that state on it first), if you have an application already in process, if you have applied yourself or through another agency and been refused at any Embassy or requested to bring other documents, if you have been banned by any Embassy from obtaining a visa; if you have a dependant’s visa for the UK, if your passport expires within 12 months or your UK visa expires within 3 months, if you have a temporary passport, if your UK visa is stamped in a previous passport but not in your current passport, if your current UK visa allows a s continuous stay of 6 months or less in the UK (from date of entry/issuance) and any other fact which may be relevant to your application. We can often advise you if you disclose the information to us. If you are refused a visa because you have not disclosed some information to us our full service charge will apply.

24. Copies of Documents. Please ensure you keep copies of all your documents, including your passport and UK visa. We do not keep copies of your documents for our records and we do not record your passport number. Once we have lodged your application in the Embassy we may be unable to access this information should you need it for any reason. Embassies often retain bank statements, employers letters and any non-original documents relating to travel, eg. faxes from hotels and internet confirmation. Therefore, if you need this information, it is vital you keep copies.