China Visa Question
 

Going to Beijing next week and I'm on a SINGLE entry visa. I'm wondering what happens if once past security, my flight is cancelled and I need to go out the next day. Will they let me leave the airport to a hotel even though I've already used my single entry?
Thanks.

Happend to La Cochinita in Shanghai a couple of years ago. She also had a single entry tourist visa. Her flight to SFO was cancelled after passengers boarded and sat on the ground for a couple of hours due to a mechanical. Everybody was herded off the plane, escorted through immigration and bussed to an airport hotel where they were fed and spent the night.

For more discussion, I'll move this thread to our Travel->China forum. Ocn Vw 1K, Moderator, TravelBuzz.

Don't sweat it, OP. I've been in the same situation before (well, never on a single entry visa, but expired visa). They would readmit you with a special stamp.

I've got a similar question. My current multiple entry visa expires 12/15, butI have a trip planned on 12/16. I'm guessing I have to go through the entire process of getting a new visa? or is there some way I can extend my current one without waiting 3 hours @ the consulate?

AFAIK, you need a new visa.

Change your trip so you enter on 12/15

you definitely need a new visa or leave the day before. Have had very quick service with 1 & 2 year multi entry visa I get through a Washington DC service. Try this website - http://www.visamailservice.com/ Service is very reasonable and have gotten visa and passport returned within one week without extra charges.

Yep, multivisaman gave you the options. If it's possible you'll be back to China after the Dec trip, within the next year, it's a no-brainer--get a new multi-entry visa. Otherwise, change the trip date. If your air ticket involves change penalties, it's likely the new visa will be the better deal.

So this means its OK to exit China after my multiple-entry visa expiration date, as long as I enter on or before the day it expires, right?

Yes. The terminology PRC visas use is, "enter before <date>".

Just wanted to see if someone knew this answer quickly.

I'm currently on a multiple-entry visa expiring in 10 months, however, my passport pages are almost completely full. My guess is I would need to obtain a new passport, what will happen to my existing visa that does not expire for 10 months? Also, I am not planning to go back to Canada any time soon, will I be able to renew my passport while in China (or must go to HK?) along with a new Chinese visa if required?

A friend of mine is in a similar situation with few visa pages left on his passport, but he's got a Residence Permit and wonders if there's a difference.

Thanks in advance for any comments.

Why don't you simply have pages added to your passport? If that's not an option, you should be able to get away with having the visa in the punched passport, but in theory they could give you a hard time for that (i.e. de facto and de jure diverge on this point).

Thanks for the response moondog. We did look into that, but Canada stopped the practice of allowing pages to be added to passports a few years ago. As much as I want to go back to Canada to breath some clean air, I'll check with the embassy for other options.

I wouldn't sweat it. When confronted with the same situation last year, I went to my local PSB (for a more important reason) and asked one of the police ladies in passing for advice. She showed me the official rule (i.e. "need to get visa transferred to new passport"), but subsequently advised me to ignore it and gave me her phone number in the unlikely event problems would ensue. I made two exits and one entry in this fashion (i.e. old and new passport combined) and the officers didn't bat an eye.