ETIAS Visa Waiver for Albanian Citizens

Albania is a nation with close ties to the EU. Since 2009, it has been applying to join the EU, and in 2014 it was awarded candidate status. Although France and the Netherlands blocked Albania’s attempt to join the EU, Albania has still benefited from close ties with it.

One of these benefits is easier immigration into the EU through the ETIAS (European Travel Information and Authorization System) visa, with Albania being brought onto the scheme as of May 2021. For a while longer, Albanian citizens will be able to travel to the EU without a visa, but as of late 2022, ETIAS visas will be required to travel in the Schengen area.

ETIAS is a new visa being rolled out for non-Schengen states, aimed at allowing the EU to monitor and screen more accurately the individuals travelling into the EU. Before Albanians come to the EU, they will have to arrange their ETIAS visa, proving themselves to be low-risk.

The ETIAS visa will give Albanian citizens access to a vast range of EU and non-EU nations in a single visa. It will allow Albanians to travel to not only the 22 Schengen states (Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Italy, Greece, Czech Republic, and Malta), but also to the non-EU members of the Schengen agreement, and the micro-states that have become a de facto part of it.

The non-EU member states in the Schengen agreement are Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland. The micro-states with de facto Schengen status are Monaco, Vatican City, and San Marino.

All Albanian citizens will require an ETIAS visa to visit any of these nations. The visa will be valid for three years, and it will allow them to travel into the Schengen countries for medical, tourism, business, or transit purposes for 90 days.

All Albanian citizens will need an ETIAS visa to travel to the ETIAS area. This includes children of any age, although there will be no application fee for minors. Albanian citizens will need to work out exactly which family members or friends are travelling with them, and organize an ETIAS visa for them all.

There are some unexpected instances when the ETIAS visa will not be required when Albanian citizens wish to travel around the EU. Firstly, to travel to nations that are part of neither the EU nor the Schengen agreement, will not require Albanian citizens to have an ETIAS visa. It is a similar situation for EU states that are not part of the Schengen agreement, such as Ireland, Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia, and Cyprus.

Different rules apply when you want to travel to these states. Albanian citizens will have to find out what visa they will need to travel. Most likely, it will be a specific visa for the specific destination nation.

When Albanian citizens apply for ETIAS visa, it is a quick and easy process. For most, it won’t take longer than 10 minutes. Usually, the only documentation that Albanian citizens will need will be a biometric passport.

Most of the application is formed of questions that should be easy to answer. They center on basic personal information, such as the applicant’s full name, birthplace and date, address, and parents’ personal information. Some of the questions will be a little more probing than this, such as those on terrorist and human trafficking affiliation, past travel to warzones, drug use, employment history, and the applicant’s past travel to Europe.

Most ETIAS visa applicants will find that they have been successful within one working day. Although the applications will be reviewed manually by border staff, they will be able to approve the vast majority, an estimated 95%, very quickly. The process can take up to 3 working days if additional documentation is needed, although it is hoped that this will be rare.

There are a whole host of reasons that an Albanian citizen’s ETIAS visa application might be denied. These include concerns that the person will pose a danger to themselves or others while in their destination nation, concerns about their reason for travelling, or that it has been discovered that they gave false information while applying.

If an Albanian citizen’s ETIAS visa application is rejected, then they have options and will not necessarily fail to get their ETIAS visa. For most refusals, the matter can be cleared up with additional documentation. The applicant will have 96 hours to provide the documentation, and the decision is moved to the nation they are travelling to. However, it could take the Albanian applicant as much as four weeks to find out if that application has been refused.