An Iranian citizen applied for a Schengen visa at the Swedish embassy in Teheran. She claimed that she was covered by the so-called Freedom of Movement Directive, and that this meant that she should not have to pay an application fee, among other things. She requested guidance from the embassy as to which documents she needed to submit to prove that she was covered by the directive. However, the embassy demanded that she paid the fee and reviewed her application in accordance with the Freedom of Movement Directive and the general regulations of the so-called Visa Code. The application was rejected. When she tried to apply for a Schengen visa for the second time, her application submission was denied, provided she not pay the application fee.

The Parliamentary Ombudsman states, that an authority should not force a review upon an applicant that exceeds the scope of what the applicant has requested and made reference to in their application, especially not when the review is dependent on the applicant paying a fee. Therefore, the embassy should not have reviewed the application in accordance with the general regulations of the Visa Code without first asking the applicant if she wanted a review of this nature after the embassy had rejected her Freedom of Movement Directive application. Additionally, the Parliamentary Ombudsman finds that the embassy did not have sufficient legal support to charge a fee, of the applicant, as she claimed that she was covered by the Freedom of Movement Directive. The Parliamentary Ombudsman states, that it is not possible to, as the embassy did, charge a fee without legal support and without referring the applicant to the application for repayment, should it later turn out that the fee did not need to be paid. The embassy should also not have refused to accept a new application with reference to that the application fee had not been paid.

The Parliamentary Ombudsman also holds that the embassy did not fulfil its informative obligations as stipulated by the Freedom of Movement Directive and that the embassy has failed in its processing by, among other actions, not giving the applicant an adequate opportunity to supplement their application.

In conclusion, the Parliamentary Ombudsman finds that the embassy’s processing was characterised by a number of serious deficiencies, which imply that the embassy did not have sufficient knowledge of the regulations or that it lacked a genuine will to help the applicant. The Parliamentary Ombudsman directs criticism towards the embassy for the deficiencies demonstrated in the processing.