15-day visa exemption is not helpful

February 10, 2022 | 08:09 pm PT
15-day visa exemption is not helpful
Three men arrive from the U.S. at Tan Son Nhat Airport in HCMC, March 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Huu Khoa
As the tourism ministry has asked the government to resume the pre-Covid visa exemption policy, many expect Vietnam to do more.

Under the policy, visitors from Belarus, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Norway, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, and the U.K. were allowed to stay in Vietnam for no longer than 15 days without a visa. Tourists from nine ASEAN countries could enjoy a visa-free stay of up to 30 days, (21 days for the Philippines and 14 days for Brunei and Myanmar), Kyrgyzstan citizens had a visa exemption for no more than 30 days and that of Chile had one for no more than 90 days.

VnExpress International readers were not excited with the 15-day period and the fact that Vietnam's big market U.S. was not included.

"Chile has 90 days free visa. USA 90 days stay but with visa. Also USA 1 year multiple visa however it is 100 BILLION dollar Vietnam export market and the largest number of Vietnamese live in the USA."
tzar17176

"As U.S. provided most of the vaccines to Vietnam, it would be nice to include our citizens in this policy."
Man of Wisdom

"The cost and the stress of traveling from my door in Germany to the door of the hotel in VN, and then stay only a max of 15 days is way too high for me. 50 days would be good."
Bernhard

"Real opening is for full vaccinated persons, access without limitation and NO PRC testing etc. Also 15 days for some countries is not useful."
Richard

"The government should decide at short notice and announce the dates. The visa waiver should generally be extended to 30 days, such as in Thailand and Malaysia. In addition, further information on the issuing of visas must be given, for example on the 1 month e-visa and the extensions and on the 3 and 6 month visas. In the future, will visas only be available at embassies, or will visas-on-arrival be available again at short notice?"
peter.w.zimmermann

"If they are going to give exemptions make it way more than 15 days but somehow I know they will just do 15 days in which case no one will come. Just give 90 days free."
Neel Kolhatkar

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