Anyone visited Vietnam this year? - Visa Query

Has anyone here been on an Azamara cruise (or any other line) that stops in Vietnam this year i.e. 2015? If you did, what happened with Visas for excursions & in particular UK citizens?

There are discussions on the Asia forum saying that rules have changed since Jan 2015 & that you may now have to provide photo, pay a lot more on board for a Visa or even get your own in advance.

Thanks.

I am on the quest right now. Next cruise includes Nam. We are getting our visa on board . No picture. Have no clue of price

I am on the quest right now. Next cruise includes Nam. We are getting our visa on board . No picture. Have no clue of price

Thanks for the prompt reply! Have a wonderful time & do report back. If you know any Brits, please ask them if the Visa was any different for them.

Looking forward to hearing all about it. We have to wait until December :(

Btw the other discussion on Vietnam Visas is here http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2141795

Is anyone who has been on the recent cruise stopping in Vietnam now able to explain what the situation with Visas was please? Also, we are now taking a private excursion which includes an overnight stop in Hanoi. If the ship does issue visas, are these OK for staying in a hotel or should we be obtaining our own before departure? We are UK citizens - others are from the US & New Zealand.

Although not that recent, we too did an overnight in Hanoi. The visas were fine for the hotel. It is a long and bit boring drive but well worth it once you get there. Enjoy.

Hi

For our visit to Nam, the ship did the onboard visa - no photograph. For our overnight stop in Hanoi and using a hotel there, we had to obtain a separate visa with photograph. This was with Celebrity who had the onboard photographers do the photo and the ship also did the rest of the visa application after we filled in a basic form. Remaining on board overnight in Hanoi (Halong Bay)did not require photo visa

This time last year we visited various SE Asia counties in a combination of land tours and a river cruise, if you enter Vietnam twice then you need a multiple entry visa.

The embassy web site gives clear instructions about visa requireemnts and how to apply, it may just be me but I/we would rather control our own visas and or vaccinations and be safe in the knowledge that we have the correct documentation prior to setting off on an expensive trip.

We saw a couple refused boarding on a cruise because they did not have all the correct visas etc for the entire trip

Just back from a Celebrity with 3 port calls in Vietnam.

Celebrity sent info to some pax before the sailing date but some of us didn't receive it and read about it when others on the RC kindly posted the info.

The message was this:

The government of Vietnam requires that most foreign citizens have a visa in order to enter the country. Your sailing is scheduled to visit Vietnam. Because of this requirement, Celebrity Cruises has arranged for visas to be provided to guests onboard. The cost for the visa is still being finalized with the government of Vietnam but as of today the current cost is $5 plus 10% VAT for transit guests and $45 plus 10% VAT for disembarking guests or an overnight stay in the mainland. The charge will be automatically applied to your onboard account once finalized. Passport photos are required to be attached to each guest application by the Vietnam government. Please be kindly advised to bring a passport size photo to be presented at check in. Applications will be distributed during the check in process. Guests that are citizens of Brunei, Cambodia, Denmark, Finland, Indonesia, Japan, Kyrgyztan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Norway, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Sweden, Thailand and the Philippines will not need a visa for Vietnam. Please kindly note that all guests need to present one copy of their passport picture page for check-in. The copy must be on either 8 ½ x 11 or A4 paper with each passport on a separate copy. We appreciate your understanding and cooperation and we look forward to welcoming you onboard.

At Hong Kong, free photocopies could be made of passports in the hall before check-in. A passport size photo could also be taken although there was a charge for this.

There were 2 forms. One for those who would only be doing shorex or independant sightseeing which did not involve staying overnight anywhere other than onboard the ship. We were billed US$6 on our onboard account for these. For those overnighting off the ship either independantly or as part of an overnight shorex the charge was US$50. We do not know what additional info was needed for these as it didn't apply to us.

We think that Celebrity had Vietnamese officials onboard to issue landing cards but are not 100% certain of this and it may depend on the cruiseline.

As we were not overnighting off the ship, we never saw a visa as such, but were issued with landing cards(with our names on them) which had to be produced each time we left the ship in a Vietnamese port. Officials stamped them. At the final port, once onboard for the last time, the landing cards were collected.

You should probably check what you might need before leaving home but for us it was a simple and inexpensive procedure.

Thank you so much for that information. Very useful.

Sent from my Samsung S2 using Tapatalk

I'm not sure if this has already been reported elsewhere on this board but just in case, I am relieved to find out that we (from the UK) no longer need Visas for Vietnam.

According the to the Vietnam Embassy (& elsewhere in the press):

"On 22 June 2015, the Embassy received the formal notification that the Government of Viet Nam decided to exempt visa for British, German, French, Spanish and Italian citizens travelling to Viet Nam (for all purposes) for a period of up to 15 days, and on the basis of meeting all conditions prescribed by Vietnamese laws.

The visa exemption period will start from 1 July 2015 and end on 30 June 2016." see http://vietnamembassy.org.uk/index.php?action=p&ct=Notice2