Posted on 07/18/2025 9:50:38 AM PDT by Red Badger
Key Points
* Visitors to the United States will need to pay a “visa integrity fee,” according to a new law.
* The fee will be at least $250, is on top of other visa fees, and may be reimbursable.
* However when the fee starts, and how to get a refund, remain unclear.
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Visitors to the United States will need to pay a “visa integrity fee,” according to a provision of the Trump administration’s recently enacted One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
The fee applies to all visitors who need nonimmigrant visas to enter, and cannot be waived.
However travelers may also be able to get the fees reimbursed, according to the provision.
Details about the new requirement are scant, which has resulted in “significant challenges and unanswered questions regarding implementation,” a spokesperson from the U.S. Travel Association told CNBC Travel.
However, here is what is known thus far.
How much is the fee?
The fee will be at least $250 during the U.S. fiscal year 2025, which runs from Oct. 1, 2024, to Sept. 30, 2025. However, the secretary of Homeland Security is free to set the fee higher, according to the provision.
Thereafter, the visa integrity fee will be adjusted for inflation.
Who must pay the new fee?
The “visa integrity fee” applies to all visitors who need nonimmigrant visas, which includes tourists, business travelers and international students.
When is the fee paid?
The fee is paid when the visa is issued, according to the provision. Thus, visitors whose visa requests are denied will not be charged.
Does the fee replace other visa fees?
No, the provision states that the new fee is “in addition to” other fees, including regular visa fees.
“For example, an H-1B worker already paying a $205 application fee may now expect to pay a total of $455 once this fee is in place,” Steven A. Brown, a partner at the Houston-based immigration law firm Reddy Neumann Brown PC, wrote in a post on his firm’s website.
Additionally, the fee must be paid on top of a “Form I-94 fee,” which the One Big Beautiful Bill Act increased from $6 to $24. That fee must be paid by anyone who is required to submit a Form 1-94 arrival and departure record, which applies to most travelers.
How can travelers get reimbursed?
To get their money back, visa holders must comply with the conditions of the visa, which includes “not accept[ing] unauthorized employment,” and not overstay the visa validity date by more than five days, according to the provision.
Reimbursements will be made after the travel visa expires, it says.
What isn’t known
The fee has not yet been implemented, according to Brown.
It is not clear when it will begin.
“I believe it would need a regulation, or at least a notice in the Federal Register, regarding implementation on collection,” said Brown.
It is also unclear how travelers will pay the fee, the U.S. Travel Association told CNBC.
“The bill directs the DHS Secretary to charge the fee, but DHS does not own the visa application, issuance or renewal process — so where and when would DHS collect the fee?” the spokesperson said.
In response to CNBC’s enquires, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said: “The visa integrity fee requires cross-agency coordination before implementation.”
More questions surround how and when the reimbursement process kicks in.
Since many visas are valid for several years, the U.S. Congressional Budget Office said it expects “a small number of people would seek reimbursement.”
Moreover, “CBO expects that the Department of State would need several years to implement a process for providing reimbursements. On that basis, CBO estimates that enacting the provision would increase revenues and decrease the deficit by $28.9 billion over the 2025‑2034 period.”
Brown said he is advising clients to treat the fee as nonrefundable.
“If you get it back, great. But it is usually difficult to get money back from the government,” he said. “I would rather them view it as a ‘bonus’ if they get the refund.”
The purpose of the fee
“President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill provides the necessary policies and resources to restore integrity in our nation’s immigration system,” a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson told CNBC.
Data shows most visa holders comply with their visa terms. For the fiscal years between 2016 and 2022, between 1%-2% of nonimmigrant visitors overstayed their visas in the United States, according to the U.S. Congressional Research Service.
However, an estimated 42% of the approximately 11 million unauthorized population living in the United States entered the country legally, but overstayed their period of admission, the data shows.
Effect on incoming travelers
Brown said the visa integrity fee will likely impact B visa holders — or leisure and business travelers — and international students more than other types of travelers.
“For B visa holders, they may not want to add an additional $250 per person to their trip costs,” he said.
The new fee, plus the I-94 fee, come as the United States prepares to host several major events in 2026, including the “America 250” celebration, in honor of the country’s 250th anniversary, and parts of the FIFA World Cup.
These hurdles are compounded by problems at Brand USA, the destination marketing organization that promotes inbound travel into the United States, which saw the One Big Beautiful Bill Act slash its funding from $100 million to $20 million.
The cuts came after the U.S. Commerce Department fired nearly half of Brand USA’s board members in April.
Brand USA did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
Ahead of the passage of the new legislation, U.S. Travel Association President and CEO Geoff Freeman praised the bill’s contributions to U.S. infrastructure, air traffic control and border security.
But, he added: “The smart investments in the travel process make foolish new fees on foreign visitors and reductions to Brand USA, America’s promotion arm, that much harder to swallow.”
— CNBC’s Kaela Ling contributed to this report.
Including the 9/11 attackers, by the way.
This could generate up to about $2.5 Billion each year...............
Despite the scare tactics in the headline, the bottom line is if you don’t violate our laws, you don’t pay.
And if you do overstay, the cost should be a lot lot more than what is proposed.
Before the Biden Open Border era, nearly half of the illegals here were on visa overstays. The I-94 visas, the ones foreigners get on the airplane prior to landing, were and accounting mess, with the airlines collecting them in boxes and sending them weeks later to some contractor for data entry, with hundreds of thousands of errors and lost documents.
That’s fine, as long as it doesn’t also cost us an additional $2.5 Billion a year to implement the new charges.
I’ve watched you tube videos on a site called Border Security that deals primarily with Aussie security.
Man, they have tough laws and make no bones about their intolerance about visa violations and imports.
The irony of Australia’s strict border security is they matched it with a loose immigration policy and is >20% foreign born. A lot of that is from the UK, but not given what the UK is looking like, that could mean different things.
I would prefer $0.00 a year because nobody is let in or invades and takes up our resources.
This scam started with Al Gore's "reinventing government" initiative to "bring the efficiency of private enterprise to government." The problem is that there is no incentive in this to produce the best product or service at the lowest reasonable cost.
Every other country is likely to impose reciprocal visa fees on American travelers.
Since more Americans travel abroad than foreign nationals visit the United States, the policy would generate higher costs for U.S. citizens than it would produce in revenue.
A “GOOD BEHAVIOR DEPOSIT”
The Bahamas charges an EXIT FEE...........
I am wholly for this. it is a deposit. You pay the money. Then when your visa expires, if you have left the country and broken no laws you get it back.
Pretty simple. There is a bureaucratic overhead cost, obviously, but I don’t think this is onerous to honest visitors.
Exactly. This does not appear to be the same as the fee of $50 I had to pay recently to visit the British Virgin Islands.
You lose that. Not paid back. If I understand it correctly, this $250 deposit IS paid back if you meet the requirements. A security deposit, if you will.
The UK does it. What a way to cut tourism.
It's a security deposit!!!
Have you checked the visa fees already imposed on American travelers?
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