If you decide to travel to a neighboring country, you will have bear the expenses on travel and accommodation. At the embassy, you will have to fill the Visa application form. Along with the Visa form, you will have to submit one recent passport sized photograph, one self-addressed envelope and your original passport. Besides submitting these documents, you will have to pay the Visa fees. The fees can be paid in favor of the Embassy of Vietnam by way of money order or cashier’s check.
The embassy will take at least five days to process your documents. Once the documents are processed, you will be issued a fully stamped Visa. Although this procedure allows you to get hold of a fully stamped Visa before leaving for Vietnam, it is quite expensive and time consuming.
In case you decide to apply for Visa through correspondence, you will have to send across all your documents to the embassy through postal mail. In this case, you stand to lose your documents if your package is misplaced or lost in transit.
The ideal way for Visa application for Central African citizens is through Visa on Arrival. In order to apply for Visa on Arrival, you will have to get in touch with a travel agent based in Vietnam. You will have to fill up an online application form that will ask for details such as your name, occupation, duration of stay, purpose of visit etc. While filling up the purpose of visit section, you will have to choose from options such as business, tourist and transit.
A business Visa comes with a validity of one month, three months and six months. A tourist Visa comes with a validity of one month and a transit Visa comes with a validity of less than five days. Online applications are usually processed in a couple of days. Once the form is processed, you will be issued a letter of approval. This letter of approval can be collected by your agent and he can have it forwarded to you.
On reaching Vietnam, you will have to furnish this letter of approval at the Visa on Arrival counter of the airport you arrive in. You will also have to submit the Visa stamping fees along with the document.
It is to be noted that the Visa on Arrival facility is available only to those travelers who arrive in Vietnam by air. For those taking land routes, it is mandatory that they carry all their documents along with them while travelling to Vietnam. In case of a cruise ship, the cruise authorities can be contacted for information on Visa on Arrival.
