For many expats, the Foreigners' Police office in Prague is the stuff of nightmares: bodies pressed against one another in an endless line, hours of waiting just to get inside the building, overworked clerks who don't speak English demanding obscure documents.

Following years of complaints and empty promises on the part of the Interior Ministry to deal with them, the Foreigners' Police finally moved last month from its rundown office on Olšanská street in Prague 3 to a modern building on Koněvova, in the same neighborhood.

Things were supposed to get better. They didn't.

While the office is more spacious and looks new and clean, with an open-plan waiting area, it's as understaffed as ever — more, actually, since the office just lost 10 employees.

"They were needed elsewhere," Foreigners' Police Deputy Director Vladimír Podroužek says. "There was nothing I could do."

Podroužek says he needs at least an additional 50 people for the place to run smoothly. When that will be he can't say for sure. "Maybe when the Czech Republic joins the Schengen area," he says. "That should free up some border guards, and they could come work here."

Foreigners who have had the chance to compare the visa application process in different former Eastern bloc countries consistently identify the Czech Republic as the one with the messiest system.

According to Edward Barner, managing director of Czech Development & Consulting, who has been living in Prague since 1994, Romania and Hungary have both made efforts to make the process easier, and have helpful multilingual staff.

Meanwhile foreigners in Prague are getting fed up. "It's total chaos," says Marina, a young Ukrainian woman who has been working in the Czech Republic for three years, who declined to give her last name. "I've never seen it this bad. Even at Olšanská the lines weren't this long. It makes me wonder why they moved."

Nora Vindušková, who runs a company that helps foreigners with visa applications at the Foreigners' Police, wonders the same thing. "I wouldn't say there has been any improvement," she says. "The crowds waiting outside are now so dense I sometimes fear for my safety."

Podroužek insists the disorder is temporary. How temporary he can't say. "What we're seeing right now is the worst it's ever been," he says. "It's nearing the end of the year, when everyone's visas are up for renewal. We've been getting around 2,000 applicants a day."

Since the Czech Republic joined the European Union in 2004, the number of people applying for visas has climbed steadily. According to statistics, the office has received 31,000 applications this year, up 33 percent from last year.

Right now, Podroužek's staff is not only dealing with the flood of new applications but it's still processing forms they had to put on hold while moving from Olšanská. "Things will get better once we get back down to the usual 500 applications a day," says Podroužek.

Still waiting

This is small consolation for foreigners who, like those on a recent day, have to pitch camp outside the building at midnight just so that they can get a place at the front of the line when the doors open at 7:30 a.m. On this day, by 7 a.m., some 500 people were standing in front of the building.

Mike Okura, a student from New York who came to get his visa extended, stands about halfway through the queue, bundled up in a thick jacket, with his hood up to protect himself against the cold. He's been standing since 5 a.m.