The Most Pain-Free Way to Receive a Vietnam Visa as a US Citizen

Vietnam recently rolled out changes to the visa program for US nationals. You used to be able to receive a visa pre-approval letter for either a 1 or 3-month single-entry or a 1 or 3-month multiple entry/exit visa. Now you can only get a one-year multiple entry/exit visa.

Ha Long Bay, Vietnam by Drone

You can see from the chart above that the visa fees & costs have risen dramatically. Visa prices for other countries, as far as I know, stayed stagnant. Vietnam also introduced a rule that if you are from certain countries and travel to Vietnam between certain months, you do not have to pay a visa fee.

In order to have a pain-free way to receive a Vietnam visa as a US Citizen, I highly recommend going thru an online travel agency that will secure your visa pre-approval letter. This process costs anywhere from $15 per person to $35 per person, depending on your group size & the agency. These agencies are also not associated with the government, so, do take their word worth a grain of salt. We had no issues with our company, Vietnam-Visa.org.

Image Courtesy of Flickr

This sharp increase in fees seems rather inexplicable considering just in May, President Obama visited the country and lifted the sale of deadly weapons to Vietnam. This is a huge increase in price for Tourists looking to visit and explore everything that Vietnam has to offer. I can see why it might be lucrative if the business visa might be raised to $135 per year because the employees are probably not footing the bill and will be in Vietnam multiple times per year. I’m about 95% certain that I will not be travelling back to Vietnam within the calendar year – so, the $135 for a one-time entry/exit for 12 months is a steep price to pay for a week in Vietnam.

Embassy of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam

If you’re looking to save a few bucks on the pre-approval letter, you can always fill out the form on the Vietnam Embassy’s website, mail it to the proper address, and wait a week or two for it to be returned. For the $15 to $35 for the pre-approval letter, it provides peace of mind – especially considering there are typos on the official form from the government.

Vietnam, I think, is finding its identity as a Southeast Asia tourist destination. Over 8,000,000 tourists visit Ha Long Bay each year – which is a 23% increase year-over-year.