The Finnish Consulate-General in the Russian city of St. Petersburg is struggling under a major backlog of visa applications. Handling times of private visas have stretched to five weeks. A Russian citizen who submits a visa application today will probably have to wait until next year to travel to Finland.
Customers of travel agencies get quicker service: visas are issued in just over a week.
Deputy Consul Pirkko Posio says that efforts are being made to speed up the processing of private visas for those who have booked trips, so that the applicants might get the document in time to travel to Finland for Christmas or New Year's.
The backlog is attributed to a sudden increase in visa applicants.
In October 20,000 visa applications were submitted in St. Petersburg. In October last year the figure was just 17,000. In September the number of applicants was 4,000 higher than a year earlier.
"It is my impression that the desire to travel to Finland has increased", Posio says.
Another factor slowing the process is the new type of visa, taken into use during the summer, which contains a photograph of the holder.
Temporary workers have been hired for the holiday rush. Up to 77 people have been working on the visas at any one time at the new Consulate-General, which was completed last year.
More than half of all visas for travel to Finland are granted in St. Petersburg.
