BuildingMyBento

I appreciate your quick reply, seigex .
Are you able to link to your post where you mentioned the statuses?

eta: indeed it does say "examined and passed," however my flight is tomorrow night (whoops!)

seigex

Here you go: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/34581391-post690.html

seigex

This is a good sign, you might have it issued out today. Which consulate are you using?

BuildingMyBento

A big thank you to thee.

Shinikenshi

I am not sure if the authorities will ever address this or offer a fix but I managed to find an edge case where entering the wrong information can effectively render your account useless.

So during the registration process, you are told to enter your country of residence and state/prefecture/province etc. Pretty straightforward, except when I looked at the dropdown list for the latter, my eyes zoomed in on California(Northern: Areas other than Southern California below) without scrolling down one more to the other option for southern California. Full disclosure, my nearest Consulate is Los Angeles, not San Francisco.

Of course, I don't notice my problem immediately. I go through the prompts, fill out the application and figure all is done. Should get my visa in 5 business days... only 3 days later, I get an e-mail that my application was rejected because it was sent to the wrong Consulate and am told to withdraw my application and send it to the correct one. Sent from the Consulate in San Francisco. No big deal I think to myself... except the option to change your "State"/Consulate is greyed out if you already have an application in progress. Panic. I withdraw the application thinking that should be sufficient, but nope. Still grayed out. Okay, maybe if I try to delete it- you can't delete applications that were already sent out, withdrawn or not. Can't delete my account either which is kind of weird as well.

And thus my account has been rendered unusable. Calling the eVisa hotline, they suggested for me to call the Consulate in San Francisco but passport desk is swamped with inquiries/calls that it's very unlikely I'll get a call back next week.

Until this issue can be fixed, guess I'm dropping off my visa application package at the Consulate in Los Angeles next week. It's extra cost to drive and park there but it's one less time I have to have my passport mailed.

MDTyKe

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/ea...october-report

This may change things significantly.

Steve M

From the article immediately above:

Quote:

One proposal is to lift all three barriers at the same time, while others call for ditching the entry cap first and observing the results before allowing the return of individual tourism and visa waivers, the paper said.

They just raised the cap from 20,000 to 50,000 a few days ago. I find it hard to believe they're going to get anywhere near 50,000 arrivals anytime soon if they keep the ERFS system in place.

Shinikenshi

After getting an actual response from the San Francisco consulate, I was able to delete my account and redo things. 6 days later, got my visa. Guess everything worked out.

rossteixeira

Im confused, aren’t US citizens also visa-exempt for 90 days? What’s the purpose of an e-visa?

od_sf

Back in 2020-2022 there was a pandemic on which resulted in travel restrictions all over the world. When Japan reopened in 2022, they did so slowly, and at first required a visa. This has been lifted, and visa-free tourist travel from the US to Japan is back.

armagebedar

As this thread is no longer relevant I am closing it.

Regards,
armagebedar
Japan forum moderator