A provision under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which was signed into law by President Donald Trump on July 4, adds a new $250 “visa integrity fee” to most nonimmigrant visa applications beginning October 1. This means many international visitors, including tourists, business travelers, and students, will need to shell out an extra $250 to visit the United States.
The fee won’t affect all international visitors. It applies to travelers who need a visa to enter the U.S. (the majority of whom already pay a $185 fee for a visitor visa—the $250 will be on top of that), including those who hail from numerous countries throughout Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Citizens of Visa Waiver Program countries, including most of Western Europe, Australia, and Japan, will not be subject to the visa integrity fee, though they’ll still pay the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) fee of $21 for stays shorter than 90 days.
The One Big Beautiful Bill’s impact on the travel industry had already caused an uproar among industry professionals, including the U.S. Travel Association (USTA), which advocates on behalf of the country’s tourism industry. In a statement about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the USTA’s president and CEO Geoff Freeman said, “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.”
Jeremy Fleischman, co-owner of Curato, a bespoke travel agency, calls the provision frustrating. Although Fleischman is less concerned that Curato’s international clientele will bat an eye at the charge, “there’s already a sense that travel is becoming more and more costly, and this just reinforces it.” Plus, for travelers on a budget, it isn’t a minor fee. “It’s a significant added cost on top of an already expensive and often cumbersome visa process,” he says, as it adds upwards of $1,000 before a family of four even steps on a plane.
It’s not yet clear exactly when or how the new fee will be charged. The fee will also reportedly be reimbursable, so long as travelers don’t overstay the visa or participate in unauthorized work while visiting. But at the moment, there’s no system in place to process reimbursements (much as there isn’t yet a system to institute the fee itself).
Dennis Schaal, founding and executive editor of Skift, a media outlet that covers the business side of global travel, told Afar that prior to the bill’s passing, the Trump administration was already making it challenging for international visitors to enter the country. “From a traveler and a tourism perspective, that $250 Visa Integrity [fee] is punitive, and it will dissuade many travelers from visiting the U.S.,” Schaal wrote in an email to Afar.
With visitor numbers on the decline, they may drop further as travelers weigh whether the barrier to entry—both the cost and the process—is worth it.
“We’ve seen similar moves in the U.K. with the new ETA requirement, and the EU’s upcoming ETIAS system is heading in the same direction,” said Fleischman, adding that “in theory, these measures are about efficiency and security, but in practice, they start to feel like an inconvenience, especially when paired with slow processing times and a lack of transparency.”
Schaal agreed that while the fee has bureaucratic backing, there are long-term economic consequences at play. “From a pure fiscal perspective, the fees go toward fraud protection and running the visitation program, but just think of the positive business impact that will never happen.”
International visits to the country “fell approximately 14 percent in March 2025 compared to the same period last year,” according to an April report from the USTA. A sobering stat from the USTA spells out the potential repercussions: “Every 1 percent drop in international visitor spending = $1.8 billion lost in export revenue annually. If this 14 percent decline were to hold through 2025, the U.S. stands to lose $21 billion in travel-related exports.”
With the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the 2028 Summer Olympics on the calendar, the new cost of entry is not insignificant. The fee “may not stop travelers from visiting the country, but it chips away at the spirit of ease and openness that travel is supposed to foster. And that, to me, is the real loss,” said Fleischman.
