Way to Russia Community and Forum

charles · Lounge Lizard Joined: 11 Mar 2006 Posts: 180 Location: USA

Has anyone applied for a Russian visa by post, from Russia?

Since it's necessary now to apply for visas in one's home country, I'm going to try posting my passport & all my documents to the Russian consulate in Seattle (USA). I'm an American citizen and I'm in Russia now on a business visa. Once I get my passport back, I'll leave Russia and re-enter with the new (student) visa. This should work, right? I'm a little concerned that they won't give me a visa when they see that I've sent my documents from Russia. Is there any reason to think they won't approve the new visa?

overseas_expat · VIP Joined: 11 Jan 2005 Posts: 691 Location: Moscow

This will NOT WORK.

1) It is illegal in Russia to mail/send/courier a passport.
2) The consulate in Seattle will laugh their heads off when they recieve your visa request, throw your passport in the trash, and keep your money.
3) You're proposing to mail all these original documents INCLUDING YOUR PASSPORT to some dweeb 12,000 miles away? Completely insane.

There has been some success for Americans getting 3 month business visas in Kiev. Whether or not this will work for student visas is unknown. I doubt it.

The Russians have never renewed visas on any kind of level that you're describing. Always the visa holder has had to leave Russia when one visa expired to get the new one and return (with a few catagorical exceptions).

The only way you're going to pull this off is to go back to America, go through the legitimate visa process, get the new student visa, and then return to Russia. Period.

charles · Lounge Lizard Joined: 11 Mar 2006 Posts: 180 Location: USA

Thank you very much for replying!! That's is a very important bit of information. Looks I'll manage to get the invitation sent to me while I'm home in the US, if OVIR delivers on time.

Way to Russia Community and Forum

Way to Russia warm-up: place both your hands in front of you and then count one word for each finger, starting from the left thumb: "Conversation Is a Way of Finding Out What You Think".

Latest forum activity (view all)

mediashark

Daria

cyndy22

Most recent activity (view all)

Latest Blog Posts

Way to Russia on Facebook

Escape Beyond the Arctic Circle

Pics from Russia

	Way to Russia Talk Lounge Forum Index -> Russian Visa Forum	All times are GMT + 3 Hours
Page 1 of 1