Travel Tip Tuesday is back – post #14 deals with on getting a travel visa approved. This sometimes stressful, sometimes last-minute travel necessity doesn’t have to be as daunting as you might think. Here are some tips on getting a travel visa approved easily!
Tips on getting approved a travel visa
Planning a trip can be stressful (and sometimes boring!) but it’s so important to make sure that you are prepared for your arrival in a new country. Whether you’re taking a quick weekend trip to Iceland, or you’re about to start a month-long backpacking adventure in Southeast Asia, one of the biggest things to think about is a visa.
For many countries, obtaining a visa for travel is the norm. However, if you’re from a country with a strong passport, like the US or the UK, or you’re just not a frequent traveler, then it can be easy to forget!
There is nothing worse than planning a holiday, booking your flights and hotels – to then be told at the airport that you can’t enter the country because you don’t have the correct visa.
I personally know two people who couldn’t visit India and Bali respectively because they didn’t think about the visa process.
It can be confusing but generally as a tourist on a short-term holiday (less than 14 days) you’ll either be able to enter a country visa-free or you’ll be able to get a visa on arrival.
However, there is also the chance that you do have to apply for a visa but the process can be quick and painless. For example, as UK citizens traveling to Sri Lanka for ten days, we needed visas. We were able to apply for them online and then ten minutes later, we received an email confirming them! When we arrived at the airport, we went past hundreds of people queuing up for their visa on arrival – it took us five minutes to go through customs and we were off!
If you’re thinking of working abroad, you’ll definitely need a legit visa. Make sure you give yourself plenty of time for it to arrive because these types of visas can be expensive. When we wanted to work in Australia, my visa only took 4 days to be accepted, but Kev’s took almost four weeks!
For our Chinese visa, we had to make an appointment at the office in London, spend a few hours waiting to apply and then we had to go back to pick up our passport with the visa in it four days later.
One thing that I have heard a lot of backpackers talk about is the risk of overstaying your visa. Do not consider this as an option even if it means you have to spend extra money on a different type or a more expensive flight home. Not only will you be fined and possibly given a short jail sentence in a foreign country, but it’s also incredibly disrespectful to the country you’re visiting and it ruins the prospect of freer travel for everyone else! You can also be banned from returning ever again so think about that too!
My advice when traveling is to look at the visa situation before you plan on visiting a country. Some places require you to have access to a certain amount of money before you go (this can usually be on a credit card if you don’t have the actual funds) or you might have to have a flight booked out of the country before they’ll accept your application.
Remember too that if your passport is expiring soon, the chances are that your visa application will be rejected! Most countries want at least six months left before you have to renew your passport, so don’t leave it too late.
Your own government website should be able to give you advice on the type of visa you’ll need for your travels, or at the very least they can direct you to the official websites of who can.
About Two Tall Travellers Blog
Jade and Kev are currently living and working in Beijing as ESL teachers. They left the UK in 2015 in the search of a more exciting life, and have since traveled to 7 new countries together. Their website, Two Tall Travellers, helps people to move away, work somewhere new, travel extensively and live the life they truly want!
Thanks for reading,
Happy and safe travels!