Yesterday, while looking through the trip requirements for documentation on the MyViking website, we found out that we needed a travel visa to enter China. This was not totally unexpected, but what was unexpected was the effort and cost to get the visa, that was totally a surprise!
Viking provides a link to a company called Generations Visa Service, or GenVisa for short. There was a set of forms to download based on the year the trip was taking place in, and it was already designated as being for a China visa. I downloaded the application forms and instructions, and that was when we realized this was not an easy task. The forms looked very complex, and there was a lot of information to submit in the application
In addition to all of the effort and required forms, the total cost for two visas through GenVisa was $814.00, ouch…….
I decided to do some research online to see if there was any advice or alternatives to using GenVisa to assist in the application for our Visa for China. I found a lot of information about the process online, and finally figured out it was not something we could do on our own, we had to use a service. Now, it was about finding a reasonably prices Visa service. The entire process of applying for a Visa to visit China has to be submitted through either the China Embassy in Washington DC, or at one of the Chinese Consulates in a select few major cities in the USA. In essence, the geographic US is divided up into several sections, each with a designated Consulate. For South Carolina, the designated China Consulate is the China Embassy in Washington, and that is where our Visa Application needs to be submitted. It is not really feasible to mail it in yourself, the forms are apparently a little tricky to fill out properly, and need to be reviewed by someone familiar with the nuances.
I also did a check online at the Cruise Critic Forums, specifically looking for information on applying for the China Visa. I was able to find some information on a couple of Roll Calls that had been set up for some of the Viking Cruise Tours similar to ours. One in particular had several discussion submittals about Visa Process, and one had a recommendation for a Visa Service Company in Chicago, one of the cities where a China Consulate is located. The people applying lived in Colorado, and Chicago was their designated Consulate location for the application submittal.
Like us, several other people going to China for these cruise tours were also travelling to other places before that time,and needed to get their passports back before the other trips began. That is one of the requirements, you have to send in your passports to the Consulate with the application in order for them to approve the application and issue the Visa.
Also, we wanted to make sure we could get a Visa before we have to make the final payment for this trip at the end of April. Without a Visa, there is no chance to go to China, and that would not be grounds for making a claim on any travel insurance. Luckily, the process is fairly quick and can be dine in about two weeks, once the application is submitted. The other good thing we found out is that the China Tourist Visa is generally issued for 10 years, and can be used multiple times if it is set up that way in the application. For persons in the USA, the fee is the same for a shorter duration visa as it is for the 10 year version, so there is no reason not to get the 10 year Tourist Visa.
In looking for information on the consulate location, I also found a link to the website for the China Embassy, and on their site was some information about the Visa Application process. One of the interesting items I found at the website was that there were changes being implemented as of January 1, 2024 to streamline the Visa Application process, and to lower the fee to $140.00. Part of the streamlining was the removal of having to submit documentation showing that al of the flights to and from China were already reserved, with actual flight numbers, and also for having specific hotel information, as in the hotel name and address for every hotel being used for the trip. As of right now, we have none of those details, and according to the Viking website for our reservation, we would not get flight information until sometime in June, 2024, not leaving us much time to get our visa completed, and our passports returned before we head to Iceland in August. Plus, since we have to send off our passports, there is some slight possibility of them being lost, and we would not have sufficient time to get new ones before travelling to Iceland. Most everything we would need to mail off would be done through FedEx, probably overnight, so it is less likely to lose something like the passports, but there is still a chance.
I decided we would contact the company in Chicago after looking at their website. The people that had used this company and had recommended them on Cruise Critic had already gotten their Visas, and it had been done very quickly and both for about $550.00 total.
I sent an email to them outlining our needs and with a few questions about the forms and requirements, and I received a response back later in the day. They also have a location in Washington DC, so they could still assist us with the application even though they are located in Chicago, and that is not our Consulate location for South Carolina. The only difference is that we would get a FedEx shipping label to send our documents to Washington instead of Chicago.
I used their website link to go to the China Embassy website to start the application online. The process is for us to fil in all of the required information into the online application, but not to submit it to the Embassy until we had it reviewed by the Visa Service Company to make sure it was properly filled out with a of the required information, and in the format needed.
I started my application first, and it was not easy. There are a lot of quirks with the online form, and not a lot of specific instructions on what to enter. I actually went to a few other visa service websites to look through their instructions and I was able to figure out a few things as I was going. It was nice that the China website gave you the ability to start the application and save it was you went, and also that it could be opened again and finished at a later time, or revised as necessary. They generated a long numerical code for each application, and that was needed to log back into the specific application.
You had to proceed at least through the first section and input all of your Passport details because your passport number was also part of the login process to retrieve the application for completion or editing later.
Unfortunately, one of the first requirements was to upload a current passport type photo, oops, that we did not have. In addition, the photo had to meet quite a few restrictions, and there was an entire page dedicated to the photo requirement, no jewelry white background, the size of the photo and the size of the person’s face/head in the photo, and of course, the facial expression.
I knew we had some photos we used for past travels to submit to Viking for their shipboard security and identification, so I found those on my computer. Unfortunately, the background was not white, so I had to massage that using Lightroom. I tried to use it as is, but it was rejected. Once I had the background white, I submitted the photo again, and this time I was sent to a photo cropping page to make sure the head/face were in the correct position and the correct size, mission accomplished, the photo was selected. Unfortunately, these photos are about two years old, so we will need updated photos for the actual submittal, but I needed to upload something before I could get to the next page of the 11 pages of required information on the application.
I filled in everything as best as I could, having to look at other instructions as I went. Something as simple as the location where my passport came from was even hard, there is no location on US Passports, only an issuing authority, the US Department of State. I saw on one set of instructions that this was what I needed to put on the form, it had to have something, it was a required fill-in.
Then there was a section in work history for the past 5 years. Under the dropdown of selections was one for “Retired”, which I selected, but I still had to fill out everything below that as if I was still working, it wanted dates of employment, the company, the supervisor’s name and phone number, and a company address. Without putting something in each required box, you could not go forward. I had read that you could use “Not Applicable” on the application for any items that did not apply, but that statement also had to list a reason for use, so I used “Not Applicable – Retired” for many of the lines, but had to use all zero’s for the phone numbers, there had to be a numerical input.
Then came the Itinerary, and it had the capability to list each city we were visiting on the trip and the dates. It also wanted hotel names, but we don’t have that, so I just used ‘Not Available At This Time” in that required box. At first, that was easy, but when I tried to input some of the cities for the cruise ports, they were not listed in the dropdown menu, and if they were not listed, I could not make an entry. I had to do some online searching to see if there were alternate names for some of the port stops, and of course, there were. After struggling with a couple of the ports, I then discovered that the form was limited to only entering five cities anyway, so I did not even put the cruise stops in at all, just the other major cities and dates.
The learning curve was pretty steep, but I knew it would be easier when I did Stephanie’s application.
I was able to finish my application, and then I started a separate application for Stephanie, which went quicker. I still had to go back into the system and make corrections several times as I continued to read different sets of instructions, I had to add middle names, and everything had to match the passports exactly, except there was not an entry on the application form for middle names, it just had to be added as part of the “given name”, or first name in our world.
It took several iterations to get to the point where I thought I had everything correct on the applications, I had to change our addresses to match the exact way they were listed on our driver’s license, which is also something we have to submit a picture of with the application package, to verify our address.
I continued on the applications the next day, making a few more tweaks based on even more information I found online. There was no definitive set of instructions to be found anywhere, each separate set of instructions I found, mainly at visa application service companies, seemed to have one area of the application where they gave more detail for some reason.
None were updated with the supposed new streamlined application for 2024, even the application form itself did not seem to follow the new guidelines.
Today, we did go to the local AAA office to get some passport photos taken, we are members and it is a free service. Unfortunately, they did not have the capability of giving us an electronic copy of the photos, so I had to scan them at home to update the two-year-old photos we had already uploaded into the visa Application to these more recent versions in compliance with the “no more than 6 months old” photo requirements.
Now, we should be set at least with the preliminary information. The next step will be to go ahead and sign up with the Visa Service company in Chicago, pay the fee, and get the applications reviewed by them to make any required corrections. Then the applications will be submitted to the China Embassy electronically, and also printed out and signed for submittal with all of the other paper documentation as`part of the Visa Service.
Leave a Reply