Why e-visa applications get rejected — and how to avoid it

How often do rejections actually happen?

Refusal is the exception, not the rule. Among the applications we prepare and review, the overwhelming majority of problems trace back to a handful of mechanical mistakes: a photo that misses the specification, a mistyped passport number, a name entered as it is printed on the passport rather than as it appears in the machine-readable zone. None of these have anything to do with who you are or where you are from — and every one of them is avoidable before you press submit.

What is at stake is mostly time and money. The consular fee — about US$52 as of mid-2026 — is not refunded if the application is refused, and processing takes around four calendar days, so an avoidable error close to your travel date can cost you the trip itself, not just the fee. The good news: many errors surface first as a correction required status rather than an outright refusal, and that status is a genuine second chance if you act on it quickly. More on that below.

The six reasons, in order of how often we see them

1. The photo does not meet the requirements

This is the single most common reason applications come back. The rules on background, framing, glasses and headwear are stricter than most travelers expect, and a photo that would pass for other countries' visas is often returned here. Before you upload anything, work through our e-visa photo requirements guide — it covers the exact specification and the mistakes that get applications returned.

2. Passport data typos and transliteration slips

The second-largest group of problems is pure data entry. The classics: reading a passport number's digit 0 as the letter O (or the reverse), transposing a date, and — most subtle of all — spelling a name differently from the passport. The form must match your passport's machine-readable zone (MRZ) exactly. If your name contains diacritics such as ø, ê, ç or ä, do not type them as they appear in the printed name field: enter them exactly as your passport's MRZ transliterates them. The two lines of code at the bottom of the photo page are the authoritative version of your data, character for character.

3. Answers that contradict each other

An application whose stated purpose does not fit its dates — or whose answers conflict with what you declared in a previous application — invites scrutiny. Keep your story simple and internally consistent: the purpose of visit, the travel dates and any earlier applications should all point the same way. If your plans have genuinely changed since a previous application, that is fine — just make sure the current form is coherent on its own terms rather than a patchwork of old and new answers.

4. Passport validity and readability

Your passport must be valid for at least six months counted from the application date — not from the date you plan to travel — and it must be machine-readable with blank pages available. Older non-machine-readable passports are not accepted for the e-visa. If your passport is close to the six-month line or due for renewal, renew first and apply with the new document; applying on a borderline passport is a refusal waiting to happen.

5. Previous violations you may not know about

Rarer, but more serious: an overstay on a previous trip, an unpaid fine, or an entry ban the traveler is not even aware of. These are not paperwork problems — no amount of careful form-filling gets around them, and the refusal typically arrives without detail. If you have any reason to suspect an issue from a past visit, we advise checking your standing before applying rather than spending the fee to find out.

6. The rare cases: security refusals and border-side concerns

A small number of refusals are security-related. They are rare, they come without explanation, and there is nothing an applicant can do about them in advance. Worth separating out: concerns about insufficient funds arise at the border, not at the application stage — the e-visa form does not ask about money, and no bank statement is required to apply. Clean, consistent paperwork prevents most questions at the border in the first place.

"Correction required" is a second chance — a refusal is not

These two outcomes are often confused, and the difference matters. A correction required status means the reviewers found something fixable — usually the photo or a data field — and are giving you the opportunity to fix it and resubmit. Act quickly: correct exactly what is flagged, check the rest of the form while you are there, and resubmit without delay. Our guide to e-visa statuses walks through every status on the portal and what to do at each one.

A hard refusal is different. For e-visas there is generally no formal appeal procedure — the practical path is to identify what went wrong, fix it and reapply correctly. That is frustrating, but it also means a refusal is rarely the end of the road: if the cause was one of the mechanical errors above, a clean second application stands on its own merits.

Prevention checklist

Run through this list before you submit. It takes ten minutes and covers every avoidable reason on this page.

An honest note about entry bans

If you overstayed on a previous trip, left fines unpaid, or have any other reason to suspect an entry ban, no application service — ours included — can make that problem disappear. What careful preparation can do is make sure you find out before you pay the fee and build a trip around an application that cannot succeed. Anyone who promises to get you past a ban is not being honest with you. If you are unsure about your history, ask us first: it is a short conversation, and it is far cheaper than a refused application and a cancelled itinerary.