Job Discussion Forums

[shanewarne]

I'm due to get my Visa renewed shortly, and not sure exactly what to do about it.

Some guy on the street offered me a 3 month visa for about $300 and he wanted the money up front. He seemed a little shady and he never even asked to look at my passport, so in the end, I took his number and told him i'll call back later.

[LettersAthruZ]

It varies day to day......just like everything in Viet Nam with no clear concrete, cut-and-dried answers.

LAST I HEARD, I had read on this board three months ago that they ("they" meaning a three month visa renewal) can be gotten for as little as $85 in Ho CHi Minh City. Whether that is still the price, I have no idea.

I went investigating for a friend two months ago in Ha Noi....and a couple different places wanted $220 for a renewal. But I have a Tay friend who is close with a Viet who is very close with somebody in Immigration, so THEY got my friend a renewal for three months (multi-entry) for $120.

Good luck getting a clear, concrete answer!

If THEE lowest you can find is $200USD, to hell with it and go jump a JetStar flight or an AirAsia flight to KL or Bangkok or somewhere for $120 R/T and get a three-month visa-on-arrival online over the Internet for $60!!

SUPPOSEDLY, IF you try a Lao/Campuchea land border visa run, you can only grab a visa re-entering Viet Nam for THIRTY DAYS ONLY (according to the last I have heard - "ninety by air/thirty by land").

[shanewarne]

Thanks for the helpful advice.

[mark_in_saigon]

Tourist visas are getting renewed in HCMC regularly by the businesses specializing in this for about $110 or so, maybe a bit more if you had some problem. If your last stamp was in the north, it costs a bit more for some reason, who knows what all kinds of problems they can have, but they are cranking them out now. They confirmed that the process has swung back to being much less restrictive, the easing was about 6 weeks to 2 months ago, as I recall.

[sigmoid]

It's a little too late now. The damage has been done. Many teachers have bailed on Viet Nam.

[mark_in_saigon]

It may be too little too late in our judgment, but to the govt of VN, it might have been the right number at the right time. Who knows? There is always some churn among the teachers. It is entirely possible they wanted some tunrover, and they might have had what they considered good reasons for that. I think if you want to analyze the question, you have to really consider that, what they were really trying to do, and if it was effective from their point of view. Our self interest is another matter, but in the overall scheme of things, not really the central issue. It would be very interesting to know more about the expats that left. Were these people who were legally and effectively teaching in the past, and suddenly found the rug pulled out from under them? Did the visa crunch just push out an equal percentage of all types of teachers, the best, the not quite so good, the most marginal, the ones who had never been working legally? Or did it alter the nature of the group? Very interesting question. The one thing that was openly stated was the desire to expel the laborers (not teachers) who were illegally working and taking jobs from the VN. I suspect the intent with the teachers (if there was any intent at all) was to do something similar, targeting illegal employment and perhaps hoping to change the character of the expat community. I get the feeling that the VN continue to want and need expats who desire to work legally, who follow the rules (to the extent anyone can), and who are sincerely trying to make a positive contribution to the country. I am sure there were some people who fell into those categories who left, but I think it is a good question how this really played out in reality, if it changed the expat community for the better or made it worse.

[toiyeuthitmeo]

Wow. This makes me feel fortunate that my employer always took care of the visa, mien phi. Never had a problem, never had to pay. I really took that for granted.