U.S. Department of State Announces New Registration Period,New Rules for 2012 Visa Lottery

Nairobi, 1 October 2010

The U.S. Department of State has announced the registration dates and new procedures for the annual Diversity Visa Lottery program, which makes immigration visas to the United States available to persons meeting simple, but strict, eligibility requirements.  The program is intended to promote diversity in the U.S. by distributing an allocation of approximately 50,000 visas per year among six geographic regions in the world. 

A greater number of visas are allocated to regions and countries with lower rates of immigration, and no visas are allocated to nationals of countries sending more than 50,000 immigrants to the United States over the period of the past five years. Within each region, no single country may receive more than seven percent of the available diversity visas in any one year.  This year, Africa will receive approximately 53% of the 50,000 visas allocated and Kenya will receive approximately 3,000.  A computer-generated, random lottery drawing chooses selectees for the visas in specific countries, hence the common name for the program, “the visa lottery.”

The registration period from this year’s visa lottery is from 7:00 pm Kenyan time, Tuesday, October 5, 2010, to 7:00 pm Kenyan time, Wednesday, November 3, 2010.  This year, unlike past years, paper entries for the lottery will not be accepted and all applicants must use the electronic Diversity Visa Entry Form (E-DV) at www.dvlottery.state.gov during the registration period.   Applicants are strongly encouraged not to wait until the last week of the registration period to enter.  Heavy demand may result in website delays.  No entries will be accepted after 7:00 pm Kenyan time, on November 3, 2010.

Another change in the program is that the U.S. Department of State will no longer notify winners by e-mail or letter that they have been selected.  It will be every applicant’s responsibility to check the website www.dvlottery.state.gov to determine if they have been selected.  Names of selected applicants will be announced under “Entry Status Check” on www.dvlottery.state.gov beginning May 1, 2011.

Entering the visa lottery is free of charge.  Only applicants who win the lottery will be charged a fee, and that will not occur until they submit their official visa application.  The fee for the application is $819 per person.

The U.S. Embassy in Nairobi strongly discourages the public from using visa facilitators or intermediaries when registering for the visa lottery.  It is extremely important that applicants secure their own passwords and login details when submitting their entries at www.dvlottery.state.gov.  This password and login details will be required to later check the status of an entry. 

For additional information, please visit the website: “travel.state.gov” and click on the “Diversity Visa” box in the upper right corner.