moondog

Well, sure, being en route when the policy took effect with the airline people trying to calculate the precise start time (jobs on line if they screwed up) certainly wasn't for the faint of heart, but this is a scenario that applies to pretty much no one.

In Sydneyberlin 's case, there won't be any such chaos or ambiguity. All the staff has to do is read/process the information that is staring them in face.

uanj

IATA - Personalised Passport, Visa & Health travel documentation advice (iatatravelcentre.com)

This is what is in Timatic

Majuki

Even if you did have issues initially, having some knowledge of what's in TIMATIC and being able to assert or escalate your case respectfully should resolve any misunderstandings that a ticketing agent might have. I can't say they're all like this, but many TIMATIC entries I've read are presented in the format of "Visa Required" and then go on to list exemptions further down in the text.

I have three examples in recent times where I was going in with a 3 to 5 out of 10 level of knowledge and had an issue with a ticketing agent.

The first was a misunderstanding at the BA counter at ORD 7 years ago when Mrs. Majuki was traveling on a Taiwanese passport. (I'm not trying to start anything OMNI/PR here.) The ticketing agent said, "China needs a visa." I replied, "That is for passengers traveling with a Mainland Chinese passport. Look in TIMATIC under Chinese Taipei." We got our boarding passes within a minute after that. Would a passenger without knowledge have been denied boarding? Perhaps not. However, knowing what to look for and what to say likely helped resolve that situation without escalation.

The second was when I was doing SYD-HND-YVR on the $600 NH J fare in late 2017. The ticketing agents briefly requested an eTA to which I replied, "US passports do not require an eTA." That cleared the issue in seconds.

The third and most complex example was at the SAS counter in Oslo back in August. A fellow FT member and I were flying on the OSL-EWR flight, and the other FT member was waiting on his green card at the time and had Advance Parole. For those unfamiliar, this is essentially a reentry document to allow someone into the US. Now, AP is clearly listed in TIMATIC. It's way down on the list, but it's there. It took 3 agents, including the supervisor, multiple phone calls to the back office (and supposedly even a telephone consultation with the US Embassy behind the scenes), and over an hour to clear the passenger to fly. Of course, he had no problem clearing passport control in Newark.

In the SAS case, I wouldn't be surprised if the ticketing agents had never seen a traveler on AP previously. There is only one flight per day to the US from OSL, and my guess, without evidence, is that almost all travelers on that flight originating in Oslo have a US passport, Canadian passport, passport eligible for the Visa Waiver Program, a green card, or USA visa.

The bottom line is that having some knowledge of TIMATIC puts you way ahead of having no knowledge. I like the example moondog gave of pi. Knowing 3.14 quickly gets you past any hurdles in 99% of cases and has in 2 out of 3 cases I have personally experienced.

Sydneyberlin

Yes! And it is EXACTLY this website that made me start worrying to begin with! As per my post and even screenshot above, it simple tells me I need a VISA (German passport, flying in two weeks time, duration of stay exactly 2 weeks so even a bit less than 15 days). No mention anywhere of these relatively new exceptions on that page, even if I scroll all the way down.

So this is the whole reason I started posting!

wwtknoyb

I have just left the Mainland for the day, sorry for my late reply but Flyertalk takes ages to load in China...if it is not blocked by cloudflare that is.

I would not worry at all about the 15 day visa free being an issue in two weeks time anymore.

If you do not have an E-SIM ready smartphone, order a Travel-Sim card for China to have WiFi for Alipay/Weixin Pay.

Have been lucky twice with ICBC and ABC Bank ATM accepting my Curve Card, but I would not count on finding an ATM everywhere.

​​​​​​I have travelled CKG-HGH-SJW-FOC-ZUH train to Shenzen-SZX-FOC ...and just left FOC for TPE, before returning to CKG and back to BUD tonight. Zero issues.

My biggest "issue" by far in every Hotel, train station, Airport, even the ultra friendly immgration officer in FOC today took four attempts to find it - before I told her the page number - etc. was the entry stamp ink was/is barely visible...and exactly placed on the AUSTRIA watermark in the passport. The stamp that I left China today next to it in comparison is visible from a mile.

Sydneyberlin

Thank you, that’s a bit of a relief regarding that 15 day VISA thing!

And no worries, I have signed up for roaming in China and got myself Express VPN too so I will hopefully be able to use the internet on my trip at the same time as being able to receive Australian 2-factor SMS on my Aussie number.

moondog

I don't know anyone in who still uses Express in China (it was our go in this forum 10 years ago, though; we even had a conga thread for it), but you might want investigate its current reliability a bit more (if having unfettered internet access is important to you).

Sydneyberlin

That’s what I did and pretty much any resource on the (English language) internet recommended this. If there’s anything that’s considered better for use in China these day, then please share as I did not come across it during my search.

narvik

Flyertalk is a funny one. It's either:

- no VPN: blocked
- no VPN: not blocked but extremely slow loading because it has to first get past Google APIs
- with VPN: blocked
- with VPN: not blocked and everything a-okay

Almost everyone agrees that the best one nowadays is:

☜😳 𝔞𝓼ţя丨ℓ𝓁ѶℙŇ ☝🐲

moondog

Feel free to msg our WeChat group (or DM me on wx) and I'll respond with a list of fast servers that can access this site pretty much all the time and also aren't especially subject to "are you a human?" puzzles.

narvik

Cheers.
It was more of a general comment, indicating the Flyertalk-access possibilities...I know which ones to use.

I have my 2 or three "go-to's" which work for everything I need them for. Usually use the §†êål†hVþñ "setting", but have to go to σρєηωєв for some specific thing.

Sydneyberlin

Just an update after my check in at Sydney airport: Of course, eyes roll, as expected, the Menzies clown at the check in counter insisted that I need a VISA and had never heard of the 15 days thing. When she told me that her system does not allow her to check me in without a valid Visa for China, my heart sank.

Luckily, the supervisor was at a desk right next to us and she has come across the 15 days thing before. It also took her ages to check me in, apparently the problem was me having two passports which needed both to be in the booking (the Australian one to come back to Australia and exit the country, the German one for China) which is usually not a problem but it seemed to have messed up the Visa thing. She somehow “manually overrode it and added a comment”, whatever this means, but it was good enough to print my boarding passes.

Now in the SQ lounge waiting for my departure. Big relief that I got my boarding passes in the end but it was quite a nailbiter, as feared.

wwtknoyb

Under these circumstances I can fully understand the check-in staff.

Pre March 14th I also had my fair share of issues with checking in for China flights. They basically have to register your arrival in China with your passport details before you are eligible/allowed to fly. E.g. Airlines like Qatar Airways make it impossible to print out boarding passes at the station abroad before someone in China gives the go ahead.

Fun fact: After the Chinese MFA published the visa free entry for Austrian citizens etc. the global media at first reported Australian citizens.

As Australian citizens cannot enter the country visa free they were absolutely correct in asking for a visa if the APIS for the PNR showed an Australian passport.

Lately the amount of manual overrides globally must have been staggering.

Save journey, have fun and enjoy your time in China.

mlin32

The médias are reporting a healthy uptick in the visitors, nearly 3 million foreign visitors came to the mainland in Jan-Feb, with a large increase from the countries impacted by the new visa-free scheme. And I know locally, that there's renewed interest here in France and Germany for leisure travel there the next couple months.

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/dipl...es-take-effect

wwtknoyb

Will be interesting to see how many people will use the visa-free scheme for the upcoming Fomula 1 GP on the 21st of April in Shanghai.