Cultural / Sports / Film Crew Visa (Schengen Short-Stay, Type C)

The inviting company signs it, on its letterhead, naming you personally, the exact dates, the purpose of the meetings and — crucially — who is paying for what. Officers verify these: a letter with no signatory title, no company registration detail and no reachable phone number is worse than no letter, because it fails a verification call. Your own side matters just as much: a leave sanction or board resolution, your employment or directorship proof, and a travel history that fits the seniority the letter claims for you.

Meetings, negotiations, conferences, trade fairs and training you attend are normally fine. What is not permitted is gainful employment — being paid by an entity in Malta, or doing work that a local would otherwise be hired for, even unpaid in some categories. That line is where business visas get refused and, worse, where they get cancelled at the border. If your trip involves anything close to it, tell us the actual plan and we will tell you which route it needs.

Up to 90 days in any 6-month period (Schengen area-wide), from the date of first entry. The window rolls: on any given day the authorities count backwards 180 days and add up the days you were inside. It is not 90 days per country and it does not reset when you leave and come back. Entries are single, double, or multiple entry as granted by the high commission. type c limited to 90 days in any 6-month period across the schengen area from the date of first entry. the schengen code allows lodging applications up to 6 months before intended travel; not later than 15 calendar days before.. Getting this arithmetic wrong is how people end up overstaying without realising, which follows you into every future application.

You apply to the country you will spend the most nights in. If the nights are equal across several, you apply to the one you enter first. Applying to the "easier" consulate when your itinerary says otherwise is a well-known refusal ground and, if the mismatch looks deliberate, it reads as misrepresentation rather than a mistake. Send us your itinerary and we will tell you which mission is the correct one for your trip — sometimes that is not Malta.

Three things sit between today and your trip: preparing the file properly, waiting for an appointment, and the mission's own processing. Malta currently states Standard processing time is 15 calendar days at the High Commission of Malta, New Delhi (from the date the file is received from VFS — not the VFS submission date). May extend up to 3 weeks for applications lodged at non-Delhi VFS centres or from Indian states outside Delhi. Applications from Cochin, Lucknow, and Nepal add 3 days transit; from Maldives add 6 working days. Allow an additional 3–6 days for the transmission of documents between VFS and the High Commission and for their return to VFS. Apply at least 4 weeks before travel — 6 months in advance is the earliest the Visa Code allows. for the decision itself. We control the first, which is usually days. The middle depends on slot releases. The third is entirely the mission's and no consultant can shorten it — anyone telling you otherwise is selling something they cannot deliver. Tell us your travel date and we will tell you honestly whether it is realistic.

Most of it is not ours. The Malta government fee (currently ₹9,828) goes to the mission and the visa-centre fee goes to VFS — both charged to you at cost, never marked up, and shown as separate lines on one GST invoice in the registered company name. Our service fee is the only part we set, and it is published rather than quoted case by case.

You send what you have on WhatsApp and a licensed consultant says the same working day whether the case is ready. We build the file around your profile, check every document against the others, write the cover letter to match them, and hold the file complete so the first workable appointment can be taken the moment it appears. You attend biometrics; we track the file to the decision (Malta currently states Standard processing time is 15 calendar days at the High Commission of Malta, New Delhi (from the date the file is received from VFS — not the VFS submission date). May extend up to 3 weeks for applications lodged at non-Delhi VFS centres or from Indian states outside Delhi. Applications from Cochin, Lucknow, and Nepal add 3 days transit; from Maldives add 6 working days. Allow an additional 3–6 days for the transmission of documents between VFS and the High Commission and for their return to VFS. Apply at least 4 weeks before travel — 6 months in advance is the earliest the Visa Code allows.). Government and visa-centre fees (₹9,828 for this visa) are charged at cost; our own fee is published, and if the visa is refused that fee comes back in full.