The Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) and Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) have signed the trusted partner agreement with the British High Commission here on Tuesday.
While the agreement was signed between FPCCI Vice-President Muhammad Farooq Dadabhoy and Visa Commercial Manager of British High Commission Ian Disdale at the Federation House, the agreement with the KCCI was inked by KCCI's Senior Vice-President Iftikhar Ahmed Shaikh and member of British visa commercial team Jason Doondeea.
The agreements are aimed at facilitating granting of visas to genuine businessmen of the FPCCI and KCCI. The essence of the agreements would be that the signatories would act as trusted partners and those members meeting the prerequisite will be granted visa On priority basis.
Under the agreements, the British High Commission will only accept business applications from the listed companies from UKTI and members of the FPCCI and KCCI. The companies found appropriate will be entitled to apply for five and 10 years' visa.
The visa commercial team will aim to reduce delays and dispose of business visa applications in very short period of time, Possibly 24 hours. The British High Commission will be at liberty to monitor the whole process in a transparent manner.
Another aspect of the agreement was that application, duly recommended by the FPCCI, would be granted longer premium visa. The visa commercial team will adopt a responsible approach for quality genuine business applications, sharing the relevant information between the visa commercial team. FPCCI Vice-President Muhammad Farooq Dadabhoy said the agreement would facilitate the business community of Pakistan in
travelling to UK, which would ultimately result in promotion of bilateral trade and economic relations. Speaking at the KCCI, member of British visa commercial team Jason Doondeea said the Commission would issue visas only to the genuine businessmen within 24 hours.
Jason Doondeea said that the agreement was in line with the UK visas strategy of developing and promoting trade between the United Kingdom and Pakistan. Replying to a question, he said that UK data protection laws did not allow us to discuss personal information with third parties. All applicants would be informed of the outcome in the first instance.
Replying to another questions, he said that premium long-term visas could be issued to the applicants if the applicant met requirements, including previous good travel history to Europe, USA, UK etc. Welcoming the guests, Iftikhar Shaikh said that under the scheme, the business partners of the community were assured rapid service from specialist to get their problems resolved.
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