visaforchina.org online application warning

[mungouk]

I was finally able to submit my new Z-visa application yesterday, at the visaforchina.org centre in Manchester (UK), and came across an unexpected problem.

 

I sat down at the counter with all my documents, which were perfectly in order except that they said the bar code on the top right of the application form was "too old" and they wouldn't accept it.

 

The date was 28 August... I had started my application online when I got my work permit notification, then had to wait 2 weeks for my magic "PU Letter" to come through.  On 14 September I submitted docs by email for verification (which is how the Manchester centre is handling it), and they said all was OK and gave me an appointment but the earliest available wasn't until 8 October.

 

It would've been useful if they'd flagged up the inevitable problem at that point, but they didn't. *grrr*

 

Anyway the result was that I had to sit down in the centre with my laptop, get online through my phone, and fill in a totally new application from scratch, including all that irrelevant information that doesn't apply to a Z-visa, plus dates, phone numbers etc. 

 

The online system does have an option to re-start a new application with previous details, but it said there was an error with my application number, presumably because it doesn't store the information for more than 30 days.  There's also supposed to be an option to save your data so you can re-import it later, but when I tried that back in September I got an error so I gave up.

 

This is quite possibly an obscure error condition that only arises when there are long delays between submitting the application online and visiting to submit in person, but then again it's quite likely this is happening more than usual right now.  In fact there was someone else in the centre with exactly the same problem, and he'd driven 3.5 hours from Newcastle to submit his application.

 

So, TL;DR:  Don't fill in your application "too early" or you may find it has expired when you get to submitting the actual documents.