The Consular Section in the Embassy of the United States in Montevideo has a "Special Application Program for American Businesses". This program includes people that work for American businesses (branches or businesses that are established in Uruguay) and are traveling to the United States sent by their companies for business. Employees of these companies may enter the Embassy on Tuesdays from 9:00 to 12:00 without a pre-scheduled appointment. Through this program, we hope that the visa application process will be faster and for your company to be able to save time when sending your employees to the United States for meetings, training, or other business activities.

Each applicant must present an original letter on company letterhead, signed by the Human Resources manager, stating that the applicant is an employee of your company, their salary, the date they were hired, the purpose and dates of their trip, and that the company will pay for the expenses of the trip. In most cases, the business visa will be issued for two years. The visa will be annotated to read that the visa can only be used for Company business travel. We will attempt to issue a full validity visa to the employee when possible. For this reason, we request that you bring the employment letter along with the documentation described on our web page section: "Tourist Visas". This will allow the Consular Officer to determine if you qualify for a full validity visa or not. This program does not include relatives of employees; relatives must make an appointment through the Visa Information System (Call Center).

Visa applicants must bring the DS-156 form to the interview completed electronically through our web page, printed and signed by the applicant, along with a 5x5 cm. (2x2") photo, a valid passport with at least six months of validity remaining at the time of the visa interview, and the Indumex receipt (proof of the machine readable visa (MRV) fee (cost $U2.620) payment. Males between the ages of 18 and 45 must also bring the DS-157 form.

If your company is already registered as an American company with the Embassy and you wish to participate in this program:

Please send us a letter on company letterhead that includes the original signatures of the managers authorized to sign the employment letters.

We hope that this “Special Appointment Program” is useful to your organization. If you have any questions please send us an e-mail: montevideovisas@state.gov and we will answer you as soon as possible.