Haitian National Police (HNP) and U.S. Embassy Target Fake Facebook Pages Defrauding Visa Applicants
In a joint effort between the HNP and the U.S. Embassy, Embassy staff worked with Facebook to remove three profiles that were impersonating the U.S. Embassy. The fraudulent profiles, which included “Ambassy usa in haiti” and “Ambassade des Etats unis en Haiti port au prince,” advertised fake visa programs. Applicants were directed to non-Embassy telephone numbers to reach people who pretended to be Embassy employees.
These profiles were fraudulent and several dozen Haitian citizens lost hundreds of dollars each by transferring money to bank accounts in the scam, lured with the promise that their visas would be automatically approved for a training program or scholarship opportunity.
The Embassy would like to remind visa applicants of the following:
- U.S. visa fees in Haiti are never paid by Western Union or bank transfer. The only way to pay for a non-immigrant visa is directly at a participating branch of Sogexpress.
- The U.S. Embassy in Haiti never uses WhatsApp to communicate with visa applicants.
- Interviews are never conducted over the phone and consular staff cannot promise issuance of a visa before an in-person visa interview.
The best place for information on the visa process is at the website, http://www.ustraveldocs.com/ht. This site and this site alone provides the authoritative information on making an appointment and paying the application fee. Applicants should only rely on this website for official information about the visa application process.
The U.S. Embassy official Facebook pages is https://www.facebook.com/USEmbassyHaiti. The Embassy maintains an additional page for United States citizens in Haiti, https://www.facebook.com/PaP.ACS.
The U.S. Embassy works every day to fight visa scams that target Haitian citizens. If you receive a call from a possible visa scammer, never send money. Instead, please contact the U.S. Embassy immediately at papfraud@state.gov.
