P3ACHY

No they're not impossible to get. Several countries are still issuing Schengen visas to Russians, like France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Hungary. Your purpose should be some type of vacation or visit to the country for which you're applying for the visa. Technically this is considered "visa shopping," but it's not uncommon, and many tour agencies in Russia facilitate this to allow Russians to visit other EU countries besides the ones mentioned.

We emailed the Hungarian embassy in Russia. They told us they accept visa applications through VFS global and when we checked, they had appointments in a week, so they look to be the best bet. They also seem to issue visas the quickest (2-3 weeks). For first-time Schengen visa applicants, we were advised to request 15 days, as it's considered a realistic vacation timeframe and improves the chances of approval. However, if your wife has had multiple Schengen visas, you might be in luck to just apply now and you'll get a 6 month visa like Pirozhok did. Our plan was -- wait until the interview letter, then immediately "plan our Hungarian vacation" and schedule the visa appointment in Moscow, and also schedule the medical examination for the day before the visa appointment (so that we could finish that and then just surrender my husband's passport to the Hungarian embassy without worrying about getting the medical exam in time as well). @SpaceCat From what I understand, they only let you reschedule after you miss the interview, that's all I've seen anecdotally. However, we have had a change in our plans because NVC put us in Yerevan, Armenia instead of Warsaw... and I thought it was going to update after DQ, but they've kept us in Yerevan. I wish you luck, and let us know how it goes.

Congratulations! Safe travels back home!

We're also DQ'ed. March 18th! It took 8 days for our DQ after document submission. @Scalpel For us it took 5 days, February 26th approval, and welcome letter came on March 3rd.

There's a development on this thought. Russia and Belarus were included in the draft list for some visa restrictions or bans. I guess we'll have to wait and see what happens with it. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/14/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html

Thank you so much again Pirozhok! We're going to give it a shot I think!

Hi Lemon, thanks for replying. And how long did it take for NVC to send your application to Poland? We're at NVC now, and I'm just trying to get an idea of how long we are going to have to wait.

Thanks so much Pirozhok. We are also thinking Hungary might be the only option because appointments are more readily available. Did you provide her with a letter of sponsorship? Did she have to show some type of certificate of employment? My husband works remotely and can't show a Russian employment certificate, but he does have land in his name in Russia which I think could be sufficient.

It's been a bit quiet on this topic lately, and recent timelines aren't helpful since there aren't many of them in Warsaw within the last year. We found out today, that it's nearly impossible to get a Schengen visa in the short time span from NVC informing us of our interview date, and the actual interview date (usually about a month and a half). We spoke to a visa center today who said the absolute fastest it could take is about a month and three weeks to get the visa in hand to Spain (France is super backed up, the next appointment time at the consulate is early May, Hungary is super strict with their requirements, require the trip to be fully paid, and Italy takes 2-3 months). This also leaves almost no time for the medical exam. Another thing, my husband has never had a Schengen visa, so maximum he could probably get is a 30 day visa being a first time applier. This gives us a potential window of 30 days to just guess when his interview will be, try to get the visa for that time frame and hope for the best? What other options could there be. 🫠 I would be so thankful to hear anyone else's stories and timelines, especially recent ones.

From what I understand, it takes maximum a month to get the visa after the visa appointment. Hey lemon pie, do you mind me asking, how long after NVC did it take to find out when your Warsaw interview was?

We had the same problem. Make sure you have all your information prepared in a separate document so you can quickly input everything before being timed out. Or fudge it a little bit so you can save the page, and then go back and add or edit anything missing. Using a VPN also helped because the whole website would block us out. But switching locations with the VPN would let us get back in.

We got our approval. 🥳 PD: October 29, 2023 Approval: February 26, 2025 Vermont Service Center

For the NVC stage, which pages of the Russian military ID are needed for the military civil documents? Or is the whole 28 page ID required? I'm assuming we also need to have it translated into English. My husband didn't serve in the military, but he still has a military ID, which states he didn't serve, and all the other information. I thought maybe because of this, we wouldn't need to include it in the civil documents, but I'm curious to hear what others did or recommend.

Do you mean single status for K-1 or single status to get married in Bulgaria? Because for CR-1, you only need divorce documents if she was married before....since for CR-1 you're not single. A lot of Russians do destination weddings in Turkey, the consulate in Istanbul would probably be the best bet.

@rikko 40 Officers for 60,000+ backlog is wild. Is everyone in that document Russian? It looks like you guys are still within the range of some of the others on there, so that can be some solace, but it's still so tough to be waiting so long. I feel for you. I'm going to send you a PM.

Thanks for posting an update and so much information on these forums. I've been saving your posts, hoping we don't end up in the same situation when we get our interview. 😥 I know so little about this process, it's like your application is just abandoned because of some details they can't verify. I think in your position I would have withdrawn the petition and gotten married, but who knows if you end up in the same position again if you applied for the i-130. But at least it would make getting a long-term visa to live with him more feasible. Really hope you get good news soon. 🙏

If you don't want to deal with it. Consider getting married in Georgia. Single status is not required from either party.

Thank you P0907!! Actually that would mean we don't need to get so many police certificates, such a relief! And thank you pushbrk! Yes we've figured out our Philippines logistics already with the onward ticket also!

Hey everyone! I'm a bit confused about some of the wording for the police certificate requirements, particularly the residence part. My husband (Russian) and I (American) have been essentially traveling around since we got engaged and now married, while we await this immigration process. We've been in Egypt (husband worked/had residence for 5 months), Turkey (tourist visa/visa-free and overstay for 4-5 months [only overstayed because of unsuccessful residence applications]), Armenia (visa-free 6 months), and now we're going to the Philippines because of the seemingly perpetual tourist visa extensions. The only country my husband had official residence was Egypt. Will we eventually need to get police certificates for Armenia, Philippines, (maybe Turkey?)? Anyone who has had a similar experience, would love to hear what you had to do!