How long does an Italian visa take to be processed?

How Long does it take to have your employment visa processed in Bahrain?

• My employer told me that they have applied it since January 2010 but now its April and still they are telling me to wait...is that normal?

• Answer:

  This can happen at rare cases. You see, since last year, there is an authority that is responsible foe all expatriate workers in Bahrain, it is known as the LMRA (Labor Market Regulatory Authority). They are the ones that provide their approval to employ expatriates. This authority was introduced to minimize the number of expatriate workers in organizations and increase the local employees. They have introduced a fee of BD10 for every employee that all organizations must pay. Also, for certain companies, there must be a certain percentage of Bahrani employees against expatriates. Since the LMRA was in action, many organizations have faced many problems, so I am quite sure this is what your employer is facing. Maybe they do not have approval to hire more expatriates! They need to solve that with the LMRA in order to proceed with your visa. Immigration refuses to issue a visa unless LMRA approval is presented. Issuing the visa after getting LMRA's approval does not exceed 3 working days, so it's not the process that is causing the delay. You can visit LMRA's website if you want more information about them. www.lmra.bh I know all of this because I work in HR and I am familiar with these issues.