An interview is often necessary in processing applications based on family ties. The applicant is interviewed by the Finnish embassy abroad. The sponsor living in Finland is interviewed by the police.
The interview is used to decide whether there are grounds for the application. Interviews are carried out when there are no documents providing evidence of family ties, or when explanations attached to the application are unclear.
At some embassies, applicants may have to wait more than a year for an interview.
For example, in autumn 2011 the embassy in Damascus will mainly be interviewing applicants who submitted their applications in May and June 2010. Interview appointments for applications submitted today are being given for November 2012. The Finnish embassy in Addis Ababa is currently interviewing people who submitted their applications at the end of 2009. Interview appointments are only being given for about one month ahead. The Finnish Immigration Service will make a decision as soon as possible after the interview, but we cannot make decisions immediately.
The Finnish Immigration Service has no influence over how long you will have to wait for an interview by the police or at an embassy. Please do not contact the Immigration Service and ask us to process your case more quickly because this will not make the process faster. At the moment we are receiving a large number of enquiries and requests to process cases more quickly. This is using up some of the time that we have available for processing applications.
6.7.2011
