Evisa for me was easy and quick, applied at night and got email in next morning.
When I arrived in afternoon in DEL. The Evisa line was empty and quick.

Ofcourse everything else is different in India, So many touts and tourist scammers. Hated the connaught place. Dirty, over priced restaurants with 40% tax and fees on food. The streets have no signal crossing signs and stop or go signs. The small restaurants for cheap food are way too dirty and unsanitary. I spend few hours in south delhi and liked it . I had7 days stay but left delhi for Nepal after just 3 days. I compared Nepal to Delhi india and Del seems to be dirtier and just way so many touts. Even the hotel employees are like that there.
Wasted 60$ visa fee for 3 people

Applying for the e-Tourist Visa wasn't too difficult. After submitting the application and making the payment online, I received an approval e-mail within 36 hours.

I arrived in DEL last week at around 9:30pm on a weekday. There were 2 queues for the e-Tourist Visa counters and I joined the shorter queue (which was a mistake as the longer queue was moving more quickly). There were only 4 people in front of me in the queue, but I waited 45 minutes (!) as it took ages for the immigration officials to process their passport/e-Tourist Visa and take their photo and fingerprints (I think it was due to technical difficulties with their computer systems).

Newbie traveler question with Visas
 

I have a pretty novice question here:

My wife has to travel to Bangalore, India for business, so we're deciding to make a trip of it. She's always wanted to go to Thailand, so we were planning on flying to Thailand, from India. Rather than flying directly to the US from Thailand, we're going to fly back to India and spend a night before heading home (for her work re-reimbursement, it is much easier to do it this way).

It will look like:
US -> India -> Thailand -> India -> US

So my questions are:

1) Do we need visas for both the initial visit (for her work) and the one day we will spend back in India before our return to the US?

2) Will coming from Thailand have any issues with Visa as opposed to the US?

3) Are there any other issues we could run into? We'll be using separate airlines to avoid the conflict with Nested/Minimum stay issues.

1. If you enter the country (clear Immigrations), then yes you need a visa. If you are remaining airside in transit for less than 24 hours, then you do not require a visa.
2. Will make no difference.
3. Can't think of any.

RuesterGAGT, also note that if you and/or your wife want to enter India on an e-Tourist Visa, that visa is for single-entry only.

Hi all,

I submitted the eVisa online application but when it takes me to the payment provider (sbiepay.com) it just times out. I tried various connections but sbiepay.com is just not reachable, the Visa helpdesk has me hanging on hold for hours and no one replies to mail. :(

Any idea?

Also, is it true that I have to use the visa (i.E. enter India) within 30 days after paying the fee? That's rather odd...

That's unfortunate! I had no such bad experience. Maybe it depends on what country you are doing it from? (I did it from the US.)

Well, in the "Instructions for Applicants" section of the e-Visa website it does say that "Applicants of the eligible countries/territories may apply online minimum 4 days in advance of the date of arrival with a window of 30 days. Example : If you are applying on 1st Sept then applicant can select arrival date from 5th Sept to 4th Oct." And since the visa is for 30 days only, it makes sense that you would have to use the visa before the 30 days are up, right?

After all, the whole point in getting an e-visa is for you to obtain it, and use it, as quickly as possible. Like in my case, I needed to be in India on the 18th and I applied for it on the 13th and got it on the 14th.

On 26 February 2016, 37 countries were added to the list of nationalities eligible to apply for the Indian e-Tourist Visa (see https://indianvisaonline.gov.in/visa...6thFeb2016.pdf)

I've updated the wiki to include the 37 new additions.

After days of forth and back with their support we figoured out it just doesn't work form Germany. I called a friend in the US and he was able to issue the payment for me. Very weird experience.


Depends... you get the actual visa on the day of your arrival. Then you can stay for 30 days. I do not see any reason, besides the usual miss of any logic, that you can't apply for a visa on arrival 45 days out and then get the visa for 30 days issued on the day of your arrival. Anyway, I confirmed with them, you need to enter the country latest 30 days after the payment was made and are then allowed to stay for 30 days.


Yes, after the payment issue was solved the approval came after 24 hours. I'm just a tiny bit worried that Lufthansa will make a stink during boarding since I do not carry a valid visa. We will see...

The chances of a stink in such cases is with the check-in agents and then again at boarding. Fortunately, at the FRA and MUC boarding gates for India-bound flights, they see lots of people with these evisas. Check-in is where we encounter more of a stink and/or delay about them, more so at some out stations than at others.

The check-in in HAM was ok, she didn't even blink an eye when I passed here the eVisa letter. Same in FRA.

Expected worse ;)

Any experience at ICN or DXB on check-in agents understanding (or not), or tips for how to make it go better?

Presenting the passport and the printout at the same time may help, as it is an indicator of being prepared.

Helped a friend apply last night at 644pm (per their confirmation email), had the "yes" by 5:36am today. Still feels weird to try to check in with just an email.

As a tip: I spent a lot of time getting the photo to be perfectly square and cropped but their website has a nice tool to square off and crop the photo you submit, so you can save a little effort.

just had a look at these countries, and Italy is conspicuously absent, the only one in all of continental Europe. Difficult not to think about the current spat between India and Italy for the Enrica Lexie affair