St Petersburg passport control

[1160451]

Hi, anybody got any info on procedure for landing at St Petersburg.

We are on a ships tour so understand the visa is included.

Just wondered if passport control is on the ship or dock or dock entry.

No big deal just discussing on another forum.

Cheers.

[Pet Nit Noy]

Hi, anybody got any info on procedure for landing at St Petersburg.

We are on a ships tour so understand the visa is included.

Just wondered if passport control is on the ship or dock or dock entry.

No big deal just discussing on another forum.

Cheers.

 

You leave the ship and enter a large modern building that contains minimal souvenir shopping and passport control. On the ground floor, you'll see a row of booths for passport control. The number of active booths varies depending on the time when you leave. According to our guide, my husband and I were number nine and ten off the ship at 8:10 AM, ten minutes after receiving the go-ahead for disembarkation. I don't think more than two booths were manned. However, the groups taking ship's tour were scheduled to meet in the lounge at 8:30, twenty minutes after our exit. That evening and the next day, I never heard anyone complain about crowds or delays, so I assume more of the booths got staffed. Still, the first day procedure is slower than the second day procedure.

 

Once cleared by passport control, we walked through a bit more of the building where we met out guide, and, then, we exited to a large parking lot.

 

We found the passport control process to much less stressful than some of the scary stories we'd heard.

 

Hope this helps.

Edited August 15, 2015 by Pet Nit Noy

[John Bull]

Immigration control is in the terminal.

 

No visa required, a tour ticket (ship's tour or pre-arranged tour thro' accredited local operators) gets you through immigration without a visa.

 

You will need to complete a two-part immigration slip (similar to landing cards issued on airplanes). These are freely issued by the ship to all passengers by the night before, no charge. Will probably be issued with your tour ticket or distributed to cabins. Spares available at customer services on the ship or in the terminal.

Complete the immigration slip with the information on your passport (passport number, DoB, etc) - do it before you go ashore to avoid wasted time. Don't separate the two halves of the immigration slip.

 

Ships' tours normally meet up at a pre-arranged location (bar, theatre, wherever) on the ship & go ashore mob-handed.

 

Take ashore:

- your passport

- your tour ticket

- your completed immigration slip

- your "sign & sail" card

 

Quite what the immigration officer does with the immigration slip apparently changed a couple or three years ago, so I won't go into detail that's possibly out of date.

 

Lines for immigration move quite slowly on your first disembarkation due to the paperwork involved.

On second & subsequent disembarkations the lines move very much quicker.

 

JB :)

Edited August 15, 2015 by John Bull

[Travelanni]

Immigration control is in the terminal.

 

 

 

You will need to complete a two-part immigration slip (similar to landing cards issued on airplanes). These are freely issued by the ship to all passengers by the night before, no charge. Will probably be issued with your tour ticket or distributed to cabins. Spares available at customer services on the ship or in the terminal.

Complete the immigration slip with the information on your passport (passport number, DoB, etc) - do it before you go ashore to avoid wasted time. Don't separate the two halves of the immigration slip.

 

 

JB :)

 

Disembarking from Legend of the Seas in May 2014 we were not given the immigration slips to complete and , on enquiry, we were told they had been discontinued. Have they been re-instated ?

To pass through immigration control we only required our passports and tour tickets.

Anni

Edited August 15, 2015 by Travelanni

[John Bull]

Disembarking from Legend of the Seas in May 2014 we were not given the immigration slips to complete and , on enquiry, we were told they had been discontinued. Have they been re-instated ?

To pass through immigration control we only required our passports and tour tickets.

Anni

 

Err, nope, Anni.

I'm going back 3 years - seems I'm out of date on immigration slips. :rolleyes:

 

One less thing to worry about :)

 

JB :)

[kitkat343]

It can take awhile on the first day because customs officials carefully inspect everyone's tour ticket and passport. Please note that they do not process families together - each individual needed to come up to the counter separately. You should carefully check the dates and times on your tour ticket, as you will only be able to enter St. Petersburg during those times. Some private tour companies will issue a blanket visa for the entire time your ship is docked, in case you decide at the last minute to add a night tour or change the times of your tour.

Edited August 15, 2015 by kitkat343

[Pet Nit Noy]

It can take awhile on the first day because customs officials carefully inspect everyone's tour ticket and passport. Please note that they do not process families together - each individual needed to come up to the counter separately. You should carefully check the dates and times on your tour ticket, as you will only be able to enter St. Petersburg during those times. Some private tour companies will issue a blanket visa for the entire time your ship is docked, in case you decide at the last minute to add a night tour or change the times of your tour.

 

There is some flexibility about the one-at-a-time requirement depending on the passport control officer and the situation. I noticed that the officers staffing the two booths when we passed through were strict about husbands and wives coming up individually. Since my husband is blind, I was stressing out. I could see that the processing took place with in silence with gestures. I didn't see how my husband would cope. I just decided to move forward with my husband and let the officer correct us, if necessary. I can only assume Russian officials recognize the meaning of the white cane because said nothing and accepted both passports when I handed them over. As he completed each inspection and he returned each passport, I collected them, one at a time. No problem.

 

I also noticed that the officer to our left allowed a mother to proceed through at the same time as her younger-than-ten-year-old son. The father in that family was processed separately.

[1160451]

Thank you very much for all your replies.

[eandj]

The officer needs to compare the info on your ticket and passport to what is on the computer. That's what takes a bit more time. Once that's done the first day it was only a glance the second day. Just be careful to have your ticket and passport.

[sophbro]

Hi, anybody got any info on procedure for landing at St Petersburg.

We are on a ships tour so understand the visa is included.

Just wondered if passport control is on the ship or dock or dock entry.

No big deal just discussing on another forum.

Cheers.

 

We gathered in the theater and were given a ticket and a place to sit and a number. When our number was called we went downstairs and were checked off the ship and were directed to this building.We had to stand in a line until we were called/directed to go to the booth where we showed the immigration officials our ticket and passport. We then went to the bus with our number on it. Before boarding the buss, When we returned, we went to the building again and stood in line and was called to a booth where we showed the official our passport and they stamped it and we were through. I was told that the speed of this is determined by how many immigration officials are sent to work to check us in and out.

If you have back to back trips from the ship then make sure you have plenty of time as this adds a few minutes.

[ctnurse]

We just were in St. Petersburg a few ago and used a private company that had issued our tour tickets. I think the first day we waited in line for about 10 mins and we were at the "window" for about 2 to 3 minutes. Our family walked to the window together and didn't have any trouble getting through together. I saw all the families doing this. On our 2nd day we were through in about 1 minute after waiting for about 5 minutes.

[1160451]

Again thank you for the replies. Very interesting .

[CrazyJess]

Hi! One our first day we were waiting in a line for about 10-15 min. We weren’t among the first to disembark, so it took some time. I proceeded together with my daughter (5 years old), no one stopped us. My DH proceeded separately. The officer compared the info on our tour tickets to what is on the computer. We had only our passports and tour tickets, nothing else. On our second day we were meeting our guide at 6 am for the trip to Moscow and we were almost the only people at the immigration control. It took not more than one minute. On the third day we were meeting at 10 am and were really the only people who disembarked so late. No waiting at all.

Jess :)

[MarGG]

On the first it was quite troublesome. We waited in the queue for about an hour and there were still a lot of people behind us. We were really happy to see our guide at last. It seemed that she was as happy as we were I should say.

On the second day we simply walked through without any delay at all.