Consulate General of India — Attraction in Sandy Springs

Most of the Staff at the Indian Consulate in Atlanta are very very helpful and very very cool to talk with, so I am giving out 5 stars to them in a hope that they will implement some or all of the suggestions as mentioned below.

Few Suggestions for the future :

Front Desk, Please do not hang up the phone while talking with the customers and applicants.

Also please try to speed up the OCI and Renunciation applications. Applications for the Renunciations or OCI should not sit there at the consulate for a 2 months.

Please try to do the camps as a one stop shop to fully complete the OCI and Renunciation applications in its entirety, including making copies, making pictures, uploading related help and payment related help etc all work needs to get done at the camp without any extra charge, lots of things can be done at a free of charge at the camp in order to attract the people to come to the camp, so that the applicants can go home worry free, simply because all of their hard work gets easily done at the camp from start up to end.

I have spoken with so many people of older age and even young educated age and they all say that they do not understand your upload process and other complicated paper work steps, so after getting some hard time, they all ended up hiring the paid agents to get their OCI and Renunciation work done and my suggestion is like this, try to make the process so quick and easy and smooth, so that even an illiterate person also can get the work done without any hassle.

If possible then please instantly issue the OCI cards and Renunciation certificates and canceled passport stamps atc all work on the spot during the one stop turn key camps.

Also please make the OCI and Renunciation application process very smooth and very quick and very easy and less redundant. Do not ask for so many passport size photos and so much of notarization of the copies. Only make us upload one digital photo taken as a selfie from our cell phones and use that. USA Passport Agency has started accepting the digital passport size photo as an upload. You can also think about it.

Take the Renunciation and OCI applications together by asking for one digital photo upload taken as a selfie from our cell phones and Take the applications of entire family together so that we can save the shipping costs. Do not make us submit one package per person, that is a lot of shipping cost to us as per the VFS rules.

Please remove the Outsourcing concept. At Outsourcing Agencies like VFS, They are not providing any toll free no charge customer service over the telephone customer service and we all usually get scared when we listen that they will charge us the $2.5 per minute to get the customer service on the phone and there is a lot of cost of FedEx mailing and processing fees at VFS and the VFS rule of loosing the fees after rejection and the rule of loosing the fees after 7 days of not being able to supply all what they need, etc all gets added to our cost. Rules at VFS are very hard and very risky for the applicants, from the point of view of loosing the fees and that is not a good thing for the applicants. Applicant should get plenty of time and should not loose the fees in any case, fees should always be fully refundable, no matter who is at fault for the delay of...

I wish there was no visa required to go to India but unfortunately that business /loot will never stop. Because if they stop that they will starve of money. The website says 10 am to 2 pm opening hours online but when we got there it says 10 to 12:30 for applications after that no submission then why their timing says 10 to 2 ? If someone goes after 12:30 pm driving an 2 hour then they’re f-up. And they don’t have to explain to you neither have to apologize for that. For us we got there before 10 am because my husband needed to go to India in imergency. But unfortunately just what we expected from INDIAN CONSULATE there was no one at the desk until 10:15 am. Someone does comes at desk but no answer what so ever for our online application for emergency. After waiting for almost 55 minuets someone came at the desk and just wrote 2 words then we are routed to ckgs and was told to come back after to consulate and your visa will be done in 10 minuets. We did everything they asked but there 10 minutes never ended. We sat there and sat there and sat there for almost 2 hours before someone gave us a passport. This place is totally unprofessional, no sense in how to answer to a applicant, no value for your time. Infact we felt that they did this on purpose to make us wait and suffer. I felt so frustrated that I wish I was never born in India and never had to visit India so all this could have been avoided. After all this wait we got visa for 6 months although we applied for 10 years and they changed us 3 times more then 6 months visa should cost. They said in emergency you only can get 6 months visa but our application didn’t say that. So it’s up to them how much visa to be granted. So now after ripping us of more money of course. I hope there business of making money ends soon. So BEAWARE guys of this people if possible check your visas, apply on time so hope you don’t have to suffer from frustration at the consulate. Also mail in rather then going there because chances are you might yell or do misbehavior and they can deny your visa but yet can take your...

Frustrating Passport Renewal Experience

I recently applied for the renewal of my Indian passport at the Consulate General of India in Atlanta. I was diligent in following all the necessary procedures and made sure that the police verification process in my local police station in India was completed. However, my experience has been nothing short of frustrating, and I’m still left in the dark about the whereabouts of my passport after over 7 weeks of waiting.

The main issue I encountered was the lack of communication and transparency in the process. Despite my numerous attempts to reach out through email and their website’s inquiry form, I received no response from the consulate. When I finally managed to speak to someone at the consulate, they were unhelpful and offered no concrete information regarding the status of my passport. Their only response was that my police verification showed as pending, even though my local police station confirmed that they had submitted it two weeks prior.

This lack of coordination and communication between the consulate and the local authorities has left me feeling stranded and helpless in a situation that should be straightforward. I find it baffling that there is no way to track the progress of my application beyond vague statements about pending police verification.

I have tried reaching out to my local police station again, and they insist that they have fulfilled their part promptly. However, the lack of a clear system to track and provide updates on passport applications has made this process needlessly stressful and uncertain.

I hope that the Consulate General of India in Atlanta can address these issues and work to improve their communication and tracking systems. Passport renewal is a vital service for many of us, and it’s crucial that the process is as transparent and efficient as possible. My experience has been disheartening, and I hope that future applicants don’t have to go through the same...