Now that I have been through the process, I thought it would be helpful to order the chaos for the sake of my own sanity and also for the sake of other poor helpless souls wanting to go to Russia so that they don’t need to search for the same information or ask the same questions. I struggled to find New Zealand specific information, which is why this post is quite detailed. (also, who knows when I will have to go through this process again so it will be good to have a point of reference just in case!)
Luckily someone at work mentioned quite early on that getting a Russian visa can be difficult and requires an invitation from someone in Russia.
My first stop was the Russian Embassy website, which seemed promising. After reading through the different visa types, I figured that I would need a double entry tourist visa because I would be flying back into Moscow from Estonia to get home again.
The first three things on the list below looked manageable without any serious thought required. I mean how hard can it be to fill in a form, send in my passport, and get a photo taken? Sure the photo is guaranteed to make you look like the devil spawn, but that’s beside the point.
NB: The list was directly copied from their website - don’t underestimate the entertainment value of playing spot the mistake (also, what was so terrible about number 5 that they couldn’t even renumber the list?)
To obtain a visa you should submit to the Consular section :
1. Filled in on-line (please see https://visa.kdmid.ru/PetitionChoice.aspx), then printed out and signed application form, one per person. While filling in the form (and not planning visiting the Consular Section in person but sending the application by post) please put a rough date you expect your courier bag would be delivered to the Embassy into the field “Date of the visit to consulate or visa center” of your appointment details questionary.
2. National passport (original) valid for at least 6 months after the intended date of departure from Russia. At least two pages (side by side) of the passport should be free from notes (additional pages inserted in your passport do not match the size of a Russian visa because they are smaller than standard pages of a foreigh passport).
3. One professional passport sized (3x4 cm) photo. The photo should be stapled to the specially marked place of the application form.
4. A standard tourist Confirmation ("Podtverzdeniye") and a tour Voucher (original of it or the additional proof of payment of the tour is required if it is purchased directly and not by means of a correspondent NZ travel agency) from an authorized hosting Russian travel agency, registered in the Russian MFA. Confirmation and Voucher must be issued in a due form, have a REFERENCE-NUMBER of the hosting company, personal data of each tourist, dates of trip, itinerary in Russia, services paid.
6. Cover letter from your travel agency in New Zealand containing:
- applicant's name and passport data- dates and points of arrival and departure in and from Russia, means of transport- itinerary in Russia- name of the hosting Russian company and its reference number- payment information (full payment of services provided by hosting Russian agency is requied)
If in doubt, google.
The Russian Embassy says that it won’t process visa applications until three months out, but I’m glad I started looking into it early because I had so many questions. What on earth is this podtverzdeniye business? Tour voucher? Me, use a travel agent? So much confusion.
Next stop, Google.
Google led me to Lonely Planet and TripAdvisor. Lonely Planet and TripAdvisor led me to a community of confused lemmings much like me.
It turns out that the tourist confirmation and tour voucher are usually purchased online through a Russian travel agent registered with Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The two documents are commonly referred to as a visa invitation or visa support documents. They state who you are, when you will be in Russia, and where you will be staying. Some companies just give you a random itinerary of hotels based on the cities you have said that you intend to visit, whereas others let you fill in your exact itinerary. Some hotels and hostels issue them, but often for a small fee and they might not issue the documents to cover your entire trip.
Given how teeny tiny New Zealand is, I wasn’t particularly surprised as to how difficult it was to find New Zealand specific anecdotes. All Russian Embassies are different, so a larger sample would have been nice so that I didn’t have to make sweeping conclusions based on just a handful of stories. Some Russian Embassies are more relaxed than others. And some are more difficult.
A little more digging revealed that the one in Wellington fell into the latter category.
According to the marvellous thing that is the internet, a mere printout of a visa invitation sent by email is not okay. They want evidence of prepayment (i.e. accommodation) and apparently they don’t accept faxed copies of the visa invitation either. One New Zealander stated that he no longer uses visa support websites that give you a random itinerary because of the proof of prepayment requirement. He instead books accommodation at hotels, pays a deposit, then gets a visa invitation from each hotel. Sure this seems easy enough, but not all hotels and hostels offer this service though. And most will charge.
I read about some New Zealanders who paid to have the original of the visa invitation sent to New Zealand from the UK so that they wouldn’t have to provide the additional proof of payment required by the Embassy, but something got lost in translation and their first application was rejected anyway. This got me a little worried as the cost of having the invitation posted to New Zealand was almost the same as the cost of the visa itself.
On a quest to dispel some myths
Sure wild speculation can be exciting but it is also dangerous, so I wanted someone to confirm what I had read. I emailed the Russian Embassy, the travel agent I used to book my return flight (in case they had any contacts), and a New Zealand company specialising in Russian tourism and visas.
I read stories about the Embassy being impossible to contact and had even been told by a Russian person at work not to expect much and whatever I did, not to go there in person. Surprisingly, I heard back from them first – so much for the Embassy being much like a brick wall. Their visa officer replied within a day, while the others took a couple of weeks. Life is full of surprises!
Kate, the visa officer was extremely helpful and was able to answer all of my questions. She even replied in pink when I suggested that for her convenience she could just put her response next to each question (there was a long list). Clearly it was the highlight of my day.
These are the things I learned:
- Double entry visas: NOT restricted to entries from CIS countries, therefore a double entry visa is fine for my trip where the second entry is via Estonia (I’m looking at you Way to Russia and RussianVisa.org for providing incorrect information).
- Podtverzdeniye and tour voucher: a copy sent by email is completely fine and the original is not necessary (which is great because the cost of having a single piece of paper sent by courier to New Zealand from the UK is ridiculous).
- Proof of payment: full payment for all accommodation is NOT necessary; deposits are okay. Booking confirmations and credit card statements are acceptable as proof of payment. We were able to pay for two of our hotels in full, but we had issues finding a hostel in Moscow that would take full prepayment. In the end, we used HostelBookers to book our hostel as they take a 10% deposit for all bookings (read commission, even though they say they charge no commission...).
- Cover letter from a New Zealand travel agent: this isn’t strictly necessary, which is great because I can’t remember the last time I went into a store and sat down to talk to a travel agent. While you don’t need a cover letter from a travel agent, you should put one together yourself covering the same points.
- Itinerary: don’t worry if your train tickets haven’t been booked yet – Russian trains can't be booked until 60 or 45 days out, so when writing out your itinerary in your cover letter, just indicate which ones you intend to book.
Assisting the Russian MFA in their revenue raising exercise
According to the World Bank, there were 22 281 000 international tourist arrivals in Russia in 2010. However, there is some double counting as it includes tourists who entered Russia more than once. It also includes visitors who didn’t need to obtain visas and visa support documents. Even if only a quarter of these arrivals had to buy visa invitations off the internet, at about US$25 each that would still be an extra US $139 256 625 contributed to the Russian economy in 2010. All for putting together a document in Word, adding in a signature block and stamp, and then sending it as a PDF.
I used Express to Russia to get my visa invitation for US$30. I chose them on the basis that if it is listed in a Lonely Planet article, then it must be legit (although given the incorrect information regarding double entry visas and CIS countries on the Way to Russia website, I probably shouldn’t have trusted the Lonely Planet recommendations as much as I did). I also wanted one that would let us put in our actual hotels/hostels knowing that I would need to send in evidence of our bookings as well as payment.
I ordered my visa invitation one Saturday and received it on the Monday. They were quick to respond when I asked if they could change the payment section from saying “all services and accommodation are fully paid” to say that I had only paid a deposit for Hotel People in Moscow. My rationale for this was that if I would be sending in all of my booking confirmations and credit card statement, the payment information on my visa invitation should probably match those things.
My podtverzdeniye and tour voucher were almost identical, except the former was in Russian and the latter in English. This is what my podtverzdeniye looked like:
They were also great when Charlotte got her birthday wrong - they e-mailed her a replacement invitation within a day.
Note that this is now the second time Charlotte has got her birthday wrong while organising this trip. It’s a good thing that she is travelling with someone who actually knows when her birthday is.
The final leg...
Once I had my tourist confirmation and tour voucher, I was able to fill in my application form. The form is pretty straight forward for New Zealanders – we don’t have to go through 10 years of travel history like some other nationalities do.
So off I went to the local pharmacy to get my photo taken, then to the post office from there. Like all embassies I have dealt with, you are required to include a prepaid courier bag so that they can send everything back to you. Again, pretty straightforward and self-explanatory. The Embassy requires payment by bank cheque (not personal cheque), cash, or postal money order. Since I was already at the post office, a New Zealand Post money order was the easiest thing for me to do.
My fail moment came when I was about to seal the bag and noticed my passport wasn’t inside. Luckily I realised before it was too late. Crisis averted.
Then came the wait… The website said it would take 10 working days, which was pretty much spot on. Now I can legally enter Russia! Success!
