Proudelitist

Brazil. Good lord, that was a lesson in incompetence and bureaucracy.

ilcannone

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Russian visas aren't that hard. What people rarely know is that when applying, no one really cares about where you stay, so you can just buy the invitation according to your needs for a few dollars and hey presto!

FlyingRabbit

USA, by far. You need to pay the fee in one specific bank (cannot do it online), then schedule a visit in one place to get your fingerprints and photo taken, then schedule an interview at another place at the other side of town, the leave your passport there for a week, then they will eventually let you know if you got it or not. A major PITA.

trooper

I was expecting the worst when applying...the website made it sound as if they actually didn't WANT people visiting! And the stated processing time!!!

I went to the Embassy (the advantage of living in Canberra is that they are all here..lol) and the folks there could NOT have been friendlier or more helpful....and that processing time? "Would you like to pick it up tomorrow?"....Great experience.

invisible

Probably it depends if you are applying personally vs some travel/visa processing company, latter is in place usually when processing work related travel.

In my own personal case the visa processing agency my company used was utter and complete disaster. My chinese visa sa denied because they did not provide adequate paperwork. Then I went to the consulate, talked with the person who explained what was needed, brought it next and and visa was ready day after. To add insult to the injury, the agency billed $80 for 'visa processing'. I was furious, but my manager said to pay, put it in expense report and don't worry about it. Which I did but as I said - it was first and last time I used that agency.

KDS777

Sounds just like my Brasilian permanent resident visa. Passport photo scanned into it, embossed, holographs, seals, stamps, etc, probably made by gnomes living underneath a palm tree in Brasilia.

Here's my experience with VISA's in Brasil..................after completing all the paperwork as previously mentioned.

----------------------------------------------------

Brasil exists for bureaucracy. I got driven crazy by it the first few years I traveled there, but now I've accepted it as just their "way of being" and it doesn't bother me at all. It can actually be funny at times.

In the other thread I posted about having to go to GIG to see the PF 3 different times in 3 different days to register and activate my permanent resident visa (VIPER). Well, the consulate here in Canada I have always dealt with had specific web instructions and the identical electronic process you describe, except their site worked just fine. So, I went ahead, did everything they asked, and sent my stuff in to them, and voila, 7 days later my passport is returned with my VIPER attached. Super easy, just like all my previous tourist visas.

Upon arrival in country, you have 30 days to register/activate your VIPER.

So, if you are in Rio, you have to go to the PF (Policia Federal) office at the airport. None of their other offices anywhere are acceptable, you have to go to the third floor of Terminal 1 at Galeao. Open from 10-4. Fair enough, I deplaned at 1015AM, cleared immigration, and walked over there.

After standing for 30 minutes in the "walk-in line" (there are 2 lines, one for preset appointments and one for walk-ins) I talk to someone at the counter, who reviews my stuff, compiled and submitted "exactly" as per the consulate's website instructions. I get sent home because I do not have a photocopy of my "sponsors" passport. Well, it never said that I needed one anywhere, and I had to send one anyways to the consulate in Vancouver who issued me my visa, along with a notarized declaration from her, as well as my "original" marriage certificate.

I phoned my wife back in Canada who takes a camera shot with her I-phone, and sends it to me by What's App. I then print it out and go back to the PF at GIG the following afternoon.

I get a different guy who reviews everything and says, great, now here's a sheet of paper with a bunch of things you need to do. It's written in Portuguese with is fine with me, but I imagine for some, it is not......heh. Why I did not get this given to me the day before is unknown, because I could have saved a trip.

The next morning I get online on the PF website and print out the 3 different forms I am required to complete, and submit, after wading thru their non-descriptive verbage. Again, none of it is in english, which is fine, but still.

After lunch I go to the CORREIOS (their postal office) which is where I pay two fees, and get two forms stamped, that I must submit to the PF office. I also complete my VIPER registration both online, and in printed form. None of this is mentioned anywhere on the consulate's website or in any documentation anywhere, except in Brasil at the PF office in GIG.

When I go back to the PF at GIG for the third time, confident that I have everything completed as they requested I am rewarded with a "thank you, please have a seat and we will call your name". 3 hours later, yes, 3 hours later I enter their internal office and get fingerprinted both in ink and digitally, as well as photographed, and then my passport page was stamped and sealed by a PF official, and I am again sent outside to wait for another hour.

At 400PM my passport is given to me with a friendly "welcome to Brasil" from the counter clerk........and I'm back in my car, fighting the traffic on Avenida Brasil.

Don't let the process turn you off from coming to Brasil.

jimmielin

Still Brazil. Oh the bureaucracy that is their policies... though at the consulates they're really nice and have their share of flexibility.
The worst thing is that Brazil doesn't really have a "expiration date" field marked on their visas, and the "expiration date" is usually added as an annotation (e.g. "Visa valid for 01 years from date of issue"). And one of the Brazilian visas I got did not have the visa valid annotation. This was so much fun because I missed a 6-hour connection after arriving with a supposedly "expired" visa.

Their immigration police told me the following different versions for the "expiration date" when the expiration date is not in the annotation:
- It's valid for 1 year from date of issue.
- It's valid for 90 days starting from first entry.
- It's valid for 1 year starting from first entry.
- It's valid for 90 days cumulative stay forever.
- It's valid for 3 years.

Of course I received the more "relaxed" rules when I asked about it at the consulate & received the stricter rules at the airport. It was fun buying a full-fare Y ticket afterwards to fix up for the missed connection while Brazilians completed tons and tons of paperwork (or so it seemed) to permit my entry, then saying "Well you're lucky today, in the U.S. I'm sure they'd just deport you" to which I really had to reply "In the U.S. they mark visas with expiration dates"

spc354

My first hand experience to secure a student visa for my daughter on a Syracuse study abroad program in Strasburg was a nightmare. First problem was they required visit to DC based on PA home address, even as she was at school in NY. Finally after much argument back and forth, interview was at NYC, in person, on a cold December morning. She had to stand outside for 1 hr on the steps of the consulate (not allowed inside). Before people retort that US requires the same of nationals of many countries, that is not a justification.

My best experience, was many years ago at the Swiss consulate in NYC. I was in the US on a student visa, applying for a tourist visa for travel over Thanksgiving. Not only was the consular officer very prompt and courteous, but I remember her reminding me not to be fooled by the relatively warm November (that year) in NY, and to make sure that I had enough warm clothes when I traveled to Zurich. She had also tips for staying in Zermatt. I remember her kind words after 28 years, enough said.

ilcannone

Reminds me of the Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan consulate offices in Moscow! At least with Turkmenistan, there weren't so many people there, but for Uzbekistan, it was a circus and a half! Yet strangely organised in how everyone knew their place despite the chaos!

pewpew

Sometime between 2014 and 2016, ending March 2017, the French government let Canadians apply for student visas via mail. It was awesome. Still, I sent so many emails to the consulate to clarify things and made it probably more complicated than it had to be. The result? I was approved one day after I mailed it in to Vancouver.

Now you have to do it in person with fingerprinting, and so I'm probably not going to do my PhD in France or get a job there even though I'm just two years away from citizenship...

miklcct

As one holding a valued passport, I have only needed to apply visas three times in my travel life:
Vietnam (2 times) - no hassle, just form, passport and money
Azerbaijan - no hassle, just apply e-visa online

and I have entered the below countries visa-free:
Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea, Schengen Area, Canada, Bulgaria, Thailand

but I'll avoid the United States because its visa is ridiculous hard to get, and it is the only 1st world country that I need a visa to travel.

WorldLux

^

And one for China. It wasn't a PITA to get a Chinese visa but overall just rather unpleasant. The staff was unfriendly and barely spoke anything else than Chinese.

Katamarino

I cast my vote for the USA, and I've had visas for places like Iraq, Sudan, in fact most of Africa, China, and so on. I love the country and the people but the arrogant attitude of their government is beyond belief; they make it clear that they consider they're doing you a major favor by even allowing you to submit an application, and the costs and requirement to go for interview are absurd.

I was approved for an L visa a few years back and when trying to pay the fee was told "Oh, our credit card machine is broken today so it's cash only". Great, let me just pull out the 2 grand in sterling I always have on me...

BuildingMyBento

Sounds like what I needed when I applied in Jakarta (on a tourist visa), but back in the states, they're...slightly more manageable.

The countries that I'd really like to visit (it's a short list) have relatively onerous procedures, but it all pales in comparison to what they'd have to do to come here (the US).

n.b. North Korea was pretty darn easy.

Loren Pechtel

Grandparents names? I don't know one of them. (He was dead long before I was born.) I don't know any of their middle names.