Vietnam's short-term visa is driving tourists away

"Retirees in Europe and America are starting to make plans to escape the cold winter at home. Until the corona pandemic, Vietnam was the destination for my wife and I for seven years. We have found many friends here who we would like to see again. But short-term visas for 30 days are of no use to us. We tried that in March and then after 30 days had to fly from Nha Trang to Kuala Lumpur to return with a new e-visa. Vietnam received $25 for the new visa and Malaysia about $800 for flights and hotel. Since there is still no indication that Vietnam will reintroduce three-month visas, we now plan to go to Thailand instead. There you can get visas for 3, 6 and 12 months. For this you have to submit bank statements to prove that you have sufficient funds. If that's what's required, we'll do it. No problem. So it is entirely up to the Vietnamese government whether our money ends up in Vietnam or goes to other countries. We cannot understand why the government is having such a hard time adopting comparable visa regulations."
peter.w.zimmermann

"Thailand now issues 3-month visas at point of entry, which can be extended to 6 months within Thailand, NO charge! It takes me a minimum of 22 hours to get to Vietnam. I always got a 3-month visa, a 30-day visa is useless, period, full stop. After 18 good years coming to Vietnam I won't bother until the visa situation is solved. Thailand here I come!"
invictus888

"I was going to return to Vietnam with my family for three weeks, but the visa and approval letter process is a hassle, so we went to Bali instead."
Michael Hall

"There are lots of people that for one reason or another want to stay longer than 30 days. Many of them have to do tedious, costly and dangerous visa runs, to Cambodia or Laos, just to line the pockets of the immigration departments there. So 3 months extension online without having to exit would be a great step forward. In the long list of visa types, there's also retirement visa, as practiced in Thailand and even easier in Cambodia. So, dear authorities, you have quite a bad reputation already among foreigners, do something to rectify that."
Jose Castroviejo

"30-day visa free is nice but just as important is bring back the 90 day visa for people that want to spend the winter in Vietnam without the hassles of a border run. Most of the beach towns are located far away from a convenient entry point. If you allow border runs, why not just allow 90 day visas? Makes zero sense."
Tim