Schengen long stay visa in 11 days. My full first time experience.

I have just received a long stay German visa for a total of 3 years to live and work there wdoing an Ausbildung and attending a language school. I received my visa in just 11 days. I wanted to share my experience with how I got it.

After finding the company I would like to work for, I found a language school to prepare myself more for the training. My plan is to leave on March 1st. Attend language prepatory classes. Then start my training September 1st.

After finding accommodation and gathering all of my documents (which I made two copies of EVERYTHING, no matter how little it might have been) I made an appointment through the German embassy’s online system for the embassy in Boston as it is the closest to me.

I arrived a day before in Boston, just to be sure I would not get caught in traffic or miss the train. The embassy said they were very strict with appointments and could cancel without notice at any time. The embassy was hard to find, it’s above the Copley shopping mall if anyone is curious but they provide thorough directions through the embassy website.

I arrived to my appointment 10-15 minutes early and had to wait about the same for my appointment. I was not pulled into a room or office which I thought I would be, but I just went up to a window in the waiting room to apply. The embassy is quite small. All of my documents were in folders and I organized everything according to what it was, ex. Insurance, school, work contract, etc. I would NOT recommend doing this. The woman looking over my documents gave me all of my paper clips back and seemed a bit annoyed at how I organized everything.

She was looking through my documents and everything seemed fine until the got to my language school. She went out back I assume to talk to someone for what felt like 10 minutes and she came back saying that she “does not know if they will accept this”. She told me I needed a specific language course through BAMF (immigration offices in Germany I believe) to prepare myself for an Ausbildung specifically. I applied anyway with that language school because I was already there.

They took my fingerprints, I paid the visa fee (about $100 I think), and filled out the passport shipping form. The Boston embassy uses USPS and ships the passport overnight. I recommend using that instead of picking up.

I heard back from them through email about 9 days later saying that they will in fact accept my language course as long as my employer has a form stating it is necessary for me to do. I provided them with that about a day later. I heard back a few hours later that the head of the visa department accepted it and they shipped my passport. (Note, someone MUST sign for the passport so make sure you pay attention to the tracking on it).

This was my overall experience, I did not expect it to go the way it actually did but I am very thankful for it. I leave on March 1st. So one week from tomorrow as if the time writing this. I hope maybe this helps someone with all of the stress of getting a visa. Good luck everyone!