Visa Fees—The Bane Of Every Traveler!
Visa is a frustration for most travellers from parts of the world where if you belong to countries whose passports don't allow free-er travel than others. I've been prepping for some new visas recently for some upcoming travel and the paperwork and visa fees itself can afford me some plane tickets to travel abroad.
I still haven't decided I want to go through all the paperwork but for now I'm in the process of applying for a couple of visas which are due for renewal if I want to travel to these countries.
If you are from India and want to travel to certain countries you will incur a lot of in visa fees.
USA visa fees is in the range of $160
Schengen visa fees are around $100
UK visa cost varies from $116 to $1000 depending on the validity required.
These are some examples basically. But these are some of the most visited regions from India. US,UK, and EU offers a lot in terms of travel opportunities and people love visiting these places for tourism. Ofcourse you get no refunds for any reasons once you pay the fee.
South East Asian countries also impose visa fees but they are generally on the more affordable side. I've never been to the African or South American continent yet so I'm unsure of the visa costs for major countries in this region.
But I reckon it would be cheaper than some of the more developed western nations.
I love doing a trip to EU once a year because it's so vast and there's so much to explore and mostly due to the fact that I have already explored a major portions of my own country so there's a lot more I can experience from traveling abroad now.
Tomorrow I have to fly to the other side of my country for visa formalities which is now spread over 2 days for a country-USA I plan on revisiting after nearly 7 years. Funnily the cost of the whole procedure of getting this over with works out to nearly half the cost of the flight ticket itself if you account for all the expenses.
Anyways, cross-border travel 100 years ago was probably simpler in terms of paperwork but with our ever growing population I suppose it's going to get more restrictive to travel around the world, even though the travel bit itself is easier, quicker and safer today.
Which are the places that you'd like to visit and have been put off because of the ridiculous visa fees and paperwork? Let me know in the comments below.
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Getting visa for US and European countries is difficult and expensive as compared ASEAN countries. If you only want to explore US, UK and Europe then be ready to spend more money for VISA proceedings. But for countries Like Singapore, Malaysia Sri Lanka this cost is reasonable. For Singapore cost is about 3000 INR and getting visa is also not difficult. I am currently in Singapore and I apply visit visa for my wife and kid 2 to 3 times in a year and Pay SGD 30 per person for 30 days visa which is 1500 Rs and process is also completely and very easy. Even I got Malaysia visa for 1 year for SGD 65 which is quite reasonable. for Indonesia there is visa for Indian passport holder and you only need to pay 21 SGD immigration tax which is not much. So as per my experience about ASEAN countries visa norms are good and at reasonable cost.
Thanks @firepower for sharing visa cost about US, UK and Schengen.
I have a recent experience, but it was not so tough as I faced 10 years ago in collecting visa for US for my mother in terms of time, money and communication. Recently I visited the Brazilian embassy with my daughter for her visa. Visa fees was Rs.8000/- and we had to wait for five days in Delhi for it. so you can imagine how much cost it was to collect visa.
It's not easy to get a Visa for Europe and America for any Indian subcontinental like India, Pakistan, Nepal people from these countries faces lots of problem to get an Visa for Europe and America.
And additional money increases the expenses up to $1000 extra..
There should be change in Visa policies and our foreign ministry department should take an action..
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point noted.
This is a good news but my country visit visa of saudia Arabia is 700$ its so expensive only of 3 months.@firepower
on the other hand if you can't afford the $160 for a Visa fee you can't afford much of a trip to America, you could blow that on a nice meal here, how long is that visa good for?
I've seen plenty of westerners including Americans complain about visa fees and what not when traveling to places where they have to pay a fee to enter. Traveling doesn't necessarily have to mean one has to be forced to blow up a chunk of their savings on unnecessary government paperwork. The kind that US asks for is absurd in itself. However, it's not just the fees, it's the unnecessary amount of paperwork, the travel to the consulate, the ridiculous rules at the consulate and a whole lot of other bullshit that follows a US visa itself works out to be very expensive. EU for example is a lot simpler and hence in the past I have spent more time in countries including EU region over US. Why should anyone unnecessarily subject to mental harassment in the form of visa formalities eh? As far as affording a trip to US, that was never a problem atleast for me. I choose not to travel there more often was because of the way they treat you at different stages of visa formalities. The country has a great potential for travel and the people there are great and I have quite a few close American friends I will spend time with when I go back. But I can't be bothered going through this shit over and over again just because the US government is shit scared about letting people into their country while they are busy blowing up others.
nobody really likes paying any sort of fees.
A reasonable amount is no problem consider the HUGE number of tourism applicants they receive globally.
I saw something saying that consulate services cost something like $130 an hour, I am sure they actually do have that much overhead. If it's several pages long and someone has to review each application. Just imagine how many there would be if they were cheaper!
Because consulate services are so expensive for an American to renounce their citizenship costs like $2500!
Question : Have you ever been to Egypt?
Not yet unfortunately. But probably next year as I want to explore a few places in Africa. This year EU takes priority yet again.
I believe it all boils down to your countries economic potential..!! When USA and Europe are now Whales we are Minows trying to become dolphins ;)
Best wishes for your every efforts to make your journey possible and enjoyable.Your a most talented guy from India you can make every thing sweet able and perfect. Thanks for the great info and best of luck again dear.
This info is very profitable thanks for sharing
Very interesting news, I like this post, very useful for all tourists.
Correct sir