Q: Is the Consular Section currently operational in the face of the recent outbreak of COVID-19 and the dramatic up tick in positivity rates?

The Consular Section has scaled down its operations somewhat in response to the latest COVID-19 outbreak as follows:

• The American Citizen Services unit will honour the appointments programmed for the month of January and remains fully staffed to address emergencies involving US citizens in its consular district.

• The Immigrant Visa unit will honour its January appointments and remains fully staffed to conduct operations.

• The Non-Immigrant Visa unit cancelled regular tourist visa appointments but continues to process emergency appointment requests, student and petition-based visa cases, and interview waiver cases. Applicants renewing tourist visas that expired within the past four years and their last interview was NOT a refusal (regardless of visa class) are strongly encouraged to opt for interview waiver processing to avoid the long wait time for an in-person appointment.

The Consular Section’s posture is based on current conditions. The section will continuously monitor the situation and make adjustments to its operations as merited.

In the interest of public safety, if you feel ill on the day of your appointment at the Consular Section, we request you defer your visit until you have fully recovered.

Q: Are other visa classes besides tourist visas eligible for interview waiver processing?

Currently, the US Embassy in Jamaica does not offer interview waiver processing for other visa classes other than B1/B2 tourist visas and H2 visas. If there is a change in that policy, the embassy will make an announcement accordingly. Recently, rumours have erroneously indicated that other visa classes are currently handled through the interview waiver mechanism. That information is false and did not originate from the embassy. More specifically, and to eliminate the possibility of confusion, interview waiver processing is not available for J1 Summer Work Travel visa applications and is not authorised for that visa class under current worldwide processing guidelines.

You can find more information on our website, www.jm.usembassy.gov

or by visiting www.travel.state.gov

. Keep on top of Embassy news on our Facebook page, www.facebook.com/USEmbassyJamaica/

and by following @USEmbassyJA on Twitter. We also answer general visa questions on our Facebook and Twitter pages.