Visa Issue
 

Let's say, "theoretically", somebody gets off a cruise ship in Beijing (Tianjin) and fails to notice that their Visa expires at Midnight. They now have only an expired visa. They are now 'stuck' in Bejing amd can't reboard the ship. Could they still be able to request a 72-hour Visa on Arrival (and where would they go for this since they are now in China illegally), or is there another course of action they should follow.
Interesting problem.

Odds are that the cruise company will notice or the immigration agents will notice. And assuming that you pass by those 2 check points then you are overstaying your visa illegally. The 72-hour visa on exemption (not a visa on arrival) does not apply if you arrive by cruise ship in any case.

Thanks for the info that Visa by exemption does not apply to cruise ship entry. I did not know that. Anyhow, it appears that the Visa was vaild on entry but expired before they tried to return to the ship. So technically, they overstayed their Visa.

Just to complete the 'saga', they were able to get 'China' to issue a 'Landing Slip' so long as they had a reservation to fly out. This was done and they will connect with the ship at it's next port. For once, a common sense solution.

Most PRC visas have an "enter before [date]" clause rather than a fixed expiration date.

In either case, if you overstay your visa, you can be fined Y500/day upon exit, but this is typically reduced to Y250/day or waived entirely in cases of minor oversights.

Thanks, Moondog.

Yeah, i was just thinking about this one again. Visas do not say when you have to leave but when you can enter last. So if you enter on a valid visa, you can stay as long as you visa says you can (30 to 90 days). As long as you enter before the "enter before" date, then you are fine.

72 Hour Visa exemption
 

Does the 72 hour exemption START when you enter immigration at Chinese airport? and countdown ENDs when you LEAVE immigration at Chinese airport?

I have an itinerary into PEK at around 5pm local time on Friday and a separate one way leaving PEK at about 2pm local time on Monday....so about 69 hours transit time...

It is measured from scheduled arrival to scheduled departure.

Refer to the TWOV thread.

You're fine if these are nonstop flights from/to different countries.

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