Effective January 1, 2008, the processing fee for the non-immigrant U.S. visa will increase from $100 to $131, The Point can confirm. The increase, according to authoritative sources, is tailored to allow the Department to recover the costs of security and other enhancements to the non-immigrant visa application process. This increase applies both to non-immigrant visas issued on machine-readable foils in passports and to border crossing cards issued to certain applicants in Mexico. 

 According to the new arrangement, “applicants who paid the prior $100 application fee before January 1” would be attended only if they are scheduled and appear for a visa interview before January 31.  Applicants who paid the prior $100 application fee and appear for visa interviews after January 31, 2008 must pay the difference — $31 — before they would be interviewed.

 Our consular source intimated that “the Department is required by law to attempt to recover the cost of processing non-immigrant visas through the collection of the Machine-Readable Visa application fee.” The rationale behind the increase in cost is related to the new security-related costs, new information technology systems and inflation, which made the $100 machine-readable visa fee lower than the actual cost of processing non-immigrant visas. “In fact, the $100 fee was already lower than the cost of processing non-immigrant visas when the fee was reviewed as a part of the cost of service study in 2004.” 

The shortfall, our sources added, encumbered the Department with the additional cost.  “We are now collecting 10 fingerprints from each applicant, and the cost charged by the FBI to review those fingerprints no longer allows us to do this.” 
The application fee has increased twice since September 11, 2001, the last time in 2002.