Tripadvisor staff removed this post at the original author's request.
What are forum guidelines?Tripadvisor staff removed this post at the original author's request.
What are forum guidelines?You can still get them on arrival. Only thing is that sometimes the airline you are flying on will ask you to show them the visa for the country you are arriving in. I had this happen with Delta once. Normally, I would get them on arrival but the last 2 trips, I've done the evisa.
Tripadvisor staff removed this post at the original author's request.
What are forum guidelines?It seems the biggest issue for me on the evisa files upload is it will reject them if they are too big, especially the picture file. has to be the 500 pixel area. fun fun.
You can get on arrival though and some airlines want to check but just tell them you can get on arrival
When EVisa initially went into effect I tried it. Guess I'm an idiot, so gave up and on every visit since (guess about 6 of them) just purchase on arrival.
REMINDER - a recent thread indicated that although the poster got their EVisa, did so too early and expired as the Visa is only good for 90days, so don't rush trying to get it till minimum 4-6/wks prior travel if wanting to be frustrated.
4sandi and Laurena,
We ran into the evisa issue on our first trip. Our arrival was just 4 days before the initiation of the then new program. Well, luckily for us we were still able to get the visa on arrival. We even had called KLM (our Amsterdam to Nairobi Airline) and they had no clue what we were talking about when we asked if the visa was required upon boarding. So I now ask, Laurena, what would happen if we were planning again visa on arrival? Was anyone not allowed to board due to lack of the visa? And to you 4sandi, I read too about the poor traveler whose visa expired just due to the fact he was being proactive and got it too early. When we were in Kenya in late 2015, no one on ground there seemed to see any issue. Just get the visa on arrival was what we heard. No problem....Is this still the case? We want to go back....
Edited: 6 years agoRastawoman123
When I flew, I was flying out of Lansing, MI, a small airport. So no one else on the flight was asked about a visa for the country they were landing in. But I suspect on the tiny plane, probably no one else was traveling internationally. The connecting flights, in Detroit and Amsterdam, I did hear a Delta agent ask if one of the passengers if he had a visa for the country he was arriving in (don't know where that was). He said yes he had one, but he was not asked to show it (and I was watching for this). So I don't think anyone was denied boarding. On the other hand, I did not want to take that risk and not have it. I found the process of the application very easy. The most complicated part of the process (but wasn't for me since I work with photos all the time) is to make sure the photo was their specific size specifications. So I just took my photo and resized it to those specifications and uploaded it. The form filling out is straightforward. You may or may not get notified via email, that your visa was approved. I got an email for one but not the other. So I just checked once a day and on the last trip, it was there pretty fast, just a few days. Then you just go to where they say you can download it, do that, and then open the downloaded file and print the eVisa. I print 2 in case 1 goes missing. The additional cost, because it was charged to a credit card and it was an bank in another country, was $2.53. Now when you get in Nairobi, despite all their signs and getting advice from an airport person which line to stand in, I was off the plane as one of the earliest passengers, had my visa, but people were jumping line to line and I was one of the last to get through and it took over an hour. I was very annoyed at that. Luckily, my bag was still there getting frequent miles on the baggage belt and my tour operator was happily waiting for me.
Thanks Laurena, I'm hoping visa on arrival is still an option when we return. It was so easy. We were through in 5 minutes. Unfortunately our bags were in the plane's hold long after everyone else had theirs. We finally asked and they found bags for the 20 or so remaining passengers including ours. We got to our hotel at mid-night.
<<EVisa, did so too early and expired as the Visa is only good for 90days>>
The 90 day validity applies to the visa in general, not just the e-visa; i.e., if you apply through the Kenya High Commission for example.
The e-citizen website will allow you to make a visa application more than 90 days in advance of travel. It should be set up to prevent this, but doesn't. The Kenyan officials approach is likely to be that you should have read the guidance notes (where it tells you about the 90 days) before applying!
We had e-visas and got through much quicker than those in our group without. This was Easter weekend and very busy. But I agree it is very random. They seemed to just stamp the passports of those people without visas so that saves time - no more filling in multiple receipts and paper visas. One new trick this year. Those managing the queues were taking cash to let people queue jump......I predict a riot!