British High Commission

Well done all concerned. My appointment was for 11am for a specific visa and by 11:25 all was completed. Now the wait begins. The only gripe I have is the biometrics wait. It seems only one person was active and there seemed to be frustration with people waiting already. Make sure all documentation required is taken and is on hand if required.

Overall the application phase went fairly smoothly, however I did use an Agency to process my application. I received an appointment to visit the VFS Centre all within a week of processing of application. The process inside VFS was quick, with the longest waiting time at the biometrics. It took roughly 40mins at the biometrics.

Very good experience. Compared to my last visit a few years back the service and friendliness have vastly improved.The staff and especially the security personnel used to make you feel like a criminal in previous years. Now they're friendly, quick and professional. Keep up the good work and please don't revert back to the previous security company, they acted like they were doing you a favour.

2019-06-05 Not a friendly crowd at all. Communicate less than the bare minimum. Doing you a favour to assist. Not making it easy for first-timers.

I would rather choose a different travel destination than deal with this organisation. They attempted to charge me R6000 to accompany my 3 month old son for an application. They refused to let me speak to a supervisor. They told me to make a new booking despite the place being empty and all staff sitting chatting. And now I am not allowed to make a new booking...

Arrived at the newly renovated offices same address to be welcomed by incredibly professional, well trained and friendly staff. My hubby and I applied for a 10 year visa after many 6 month visas and I recognised some of the old staff. We applied with the options to upload all docs. You are requested to print your receipt on line as this is your proof of appointment, payment etc.which you HAVE TO PRINT OUT and take with you. Front desk does all the screening and if you follow on line instructions and have all the correct doc's, this process takes less than 5 minutes and they super friendly ladies. You then off to biometrics and i had a staff member whose assisted me many times before. I apologise I never asked your name. She's quiet and professional and her and i had a good laugh about my photo's which I "hilariously" asked her to airbrush, and we just had a few good laughs whilst in the booth taking fingerprints etc. Whats a day without a laugh...... absolutely highly professional staff and before I reached home, I received an email saying passport gone to next division to be approved. Can't fault that!! Well done Sandton staff, once again I give you 5 out of 5. Keep up the excellent work.

Sandton UK Visas & Immigration Centre: We arrived at our appointment in good time. We had all the documents we needed. The woman at the front desk told us that we needed to print out our application form. The email that we received from TLS JHB had not indicated we needed to do this. When I tried to explain this to her she showed absolute disinterest in our case. She was rude and officious. We had to wait a while to get onto one of the two computers to print out our application. We explained to another person that we were not told to print this out previously and now our time was being seriously wasted. Once again - disinterest - and did not even bother to look us in the eye. She walked away. Eventually we found a manager who was duly apologetic - he gained the organisation 1 star from us. We understand there there can be glitches in the system but the service was shocking. This is not a governmental service. They are not doing us a free favour. We are paying good money! If the first person we spoke to took some time to understand what we were saying, speak to us politely and like adults and not naughty children who have not done their homework then I would be understanding and happy. The lady who processed our documents was friendly, funny and improved the experience from a 1 to 2 stars. The person who took our biometrics was polite but not very friendly. I don't think friendliness and politeness is too much to ask! I hope to have a better service from TLS staff next time. While our experience at the offices was pretty substandard, we got our visas in good time and pick up was easy. Raising my rating to 3 stars ;

Either the system is broken or the people that work here are extremely mean spirited. My appointment was at 1:30. Somehow I was moved to the very back of the queue so I had to miss work and wait for over 4 hours to get through this process. I asked the people who work here several times why I kept getting skipped and only on my third request did anything happen. When they did the same thing again at biometrics they refused to help me so I had to sit for another 45 minutes until everybody that came after me had been helped. Edit: I was told that these people messed up my application so I may have to start this whole process again. The level of incompetence is starting to feel like spite

The people working there are very friendly. The process did not take as long as I had expected.

Went on a quite Tuesday for a UK visa. Was done within half an hour. So it was good. Not too friendly service though. Charged me R21 for the SMS to tell me when the passport is ready which was weird considering how much you have to pay for the visa. But as far as these things go it could have been worse. Update: Recieved my visa 7 days later, so it was quite quick..