Koby

@leiserom: you might want to reconsider the amount of detail you provided in post #14. Are you sure your "nephew and his wife" are happy with you posting this here?

Stewie Mac

So, trip looks like it's back on again, at short notice.

Does anyone have experience of applying for a short term visa, ideally from the UK and not from an oil company?

If it does go ahead, I will post back with my experiences in a couple of weeks...

Stewie Mac

Reporting back, as promised. So, it seems like Angola has tightened up on short term visas, which are now effectively ONLY available to oilcos - in so far as the invitation letter MUST be stamped by the petroleum ministry. However, the embassy guys came up with the solution of rushing through ordinary visas, which worked a treat - dropped off paperwork on Monday, collected passports with visas this morning. Unfortunately, the client (one of the world's biggest CPG companies) could only manage to get 1 visa out of 11 applied for, and so they have postponed the trip.

What can I say - I must have a nice face!

ironmanjt

They must have seen how hauteboy and I behaved

bizking786

what was the requirment For Angola Transit Visa At Houston consulate i will Be Applying next Week

ironmanjt

No clue, since hauteboy was denied. He did, however, get a tourist visa.

In DC, they were happy with my plane tickets and hotel reservation, along with an explanation letter in Portuguese. They seemed to believe that the only way from Pointe-Noire to Sao Tome was via Angola.

hauteboy

Actually i ended up with a 30-day visa for the price of Transit. Prepare to wait there will be 20-30 oil workers applying for visas. I tried to apply for transit there unsuccessfully.

bizking786

Thanks Every one For Reply I will Let Every one Know About Experiance

Tychian

hauteboy - can you possibly provide any more details? Did they deny you on the spot, or what?
I ask for details because I live in California.
So any application I make that has to be in-person, will be very time-limited (ie, I'll need to fly back home the next day or so).

I'm hoping to apply via NYC, assuming there's still a consulate there.

hauteboy

I went to the consulate in person and asked about transit visas. They outright said they didn't issue transit visas, something about their computer system wouldn't allow it. I asked them to try anyway and got a call 3-4 days later denying the transit visa request... but then they offered to try for a 30-day.

Sabasi

The Angolan embassy in the UK issues 5-day transit visas for £31.

Tychian

Thanks hb - I'm betting that's what the NYC embassy will also say, their website ( http://www.angolaconsulateny.org/ - it doesn't seem to readily come up when searching) doesn't mention transit visas, though the DC embassy's page does. The question will be what they can/will do in place, I hope they'll be helpful as Houston was

cargueiro

From what I understand, Angola does not require transit visas. For instance, if you are mad and fly Windhoek to Luanda to Frankfurt on Air Namibia and Lufthansa, you don't need a transit visa to fly via LAD.

I don't why the UK embassy offers transit visas. UK nationals don't need transit visa to transit LAD. It is possible the Angolans demand transit visas for some nationalities.

Tychian

If you're talking about connecting in LAD, I think you're right. Now that SVO has cleaned up its act, I'm not sure very many international airports still require a transit visa (I think JED is still a problem if changing terminals, like SVO used to be). Usually they just don't let you leave the airport.

That said, I - and I think the others here speaking about transit visas - mean the visa needed to leave the airport in Luanda. As far as I can tell, and at least for Americans, that does require an Angolan visa, be it transit, tourist, or other.

Tychian

For those interested - my NY Angolan Consulate experience was interesting.
They were very polite, and not busy - just one family of missionaries ahead of me.
They did seem able to process a transit visa -their computer system seemed to recognize it, but I got the sense they don't get many transit visa requests, so I would not be surprised if someone else's experience varied from mine.

That said, while they did take my fingerprints, application, etc, they want me to send my passport back 10 days before my travel date, to get the actual visa. They were very specific, and adamant, that they couldn't issue the transit visa until the period 10 days before. They did seem to agree that it was ok to send it 10 days before I leave the US (Angola is towards the end of my trip). To get that to be accepted, the airline itinerary seemed required.

They did not wish to accept my self-generated itinerary to represent a formal documentation of my trip, but they did accept the airline flight itinerary as more properly 'official' - coupled with hotel reservations, that seemed to be what they needed.

They also said that the visa would be issued only for the amount of days for which I could show a hotel reservation - doesn't seem to be a 5-day default for this consulate. They also said that they call the hotel(s) before issuing the visa, so that may be why they don't process until 10 days prior.

Overall, DC sounds like an easier location for US applicants for the Angolan transit visa; I'll try to remember to post my final results when I submit my passport this August.