(a) Evidence of visa. An immigrant visa shall be evidenced by a physical visa or by an electronic visa located in the Department's records. The appropriate symbol as prescribed in § 42.11, showing the classification of the alien, shall be entered on the visa.
(b) Visa format. A machine-readable visa shall be in the format designated by the Department, and contain, at a minimum, the following data:
(1) Full name of the immigrant;
(2) Visa symbol;
(3) Location of the visa issuing office;
(4) Passport number;
(5) The registration number (A-number) assigned to the immigrant;
(6) Sex;
(7) Date of birth;
(8) Nationality;
(9) Date of issuance;
(10) Date of expiration;
(11) Visa control number;
(12) Any annotations entered to reflect waivers or other information useful to an immigration officer at a port of entry (POE) upon the immigrant's application for admission to the United States;
(13) A digitized photo of the immigrant; and
(14) Machine-readable data that can be processed by an immigration officer at a POE.
(c) Disposition of supporting documents. Post shall, wherever possible, return original supporting documents furnished by the alien. Duplicate copies may be retained in the consular system, as required or necessary.
[84 FR 35299, July 23, 2019]