SA’s immigration landscape has changed drastically over the past 18 months, bringing with it a host of new hurdles that have become a nightmare for businesses to navigate.

Now it appears that the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) is rejecting visas for seemingly frivolous – or incorrect – reasons reports BusinessTech.

That’s according to immigration specialist, Xpatweb, which says individuals, HR professionals and businesses looking to draw critical skills have always faced an uphill battle with work visa applications – dealing with long wait times and a complex application process.

However, over the past 18 months even more hurdles have been introduced.

‘While most of these changes have been to rectify the issues within the DHA, it has resulted in lengthy processing times and mounting rejections for frivolous reasons,’ the group said.

As previously reported, SA has a massive backlog of visa applications.

The DHA earlier this year indicated that it was well over 62 000 and that it would only be resolved by mid-2024 at the earliest.

Xpatweb noted that the backlog within the DHA has persisted since 2016, and little has been done to resolve it.

Full BusinessTech report