Visas and border crossings forum

There is no such thing as Visa On Arrival for China. You must always arrange your visa before you arrived at the border. But the possibility of a one day border town pass is sometimes available (depends on location)

As far as I am concerned, in the entire SEA region, there is only Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Burma that offered some sort of VOA.

Well a friend of mine (Canadian) did get a 2 week visa on arrival a few months before the Olympics.

Does anyone have any recent info? Apparently travel agents in Luang Namtha told him it was possible and it worked! Just musing about my next trip which will probably involve N Laos and I haven't been to China yet....I wouldn't mind a quick look see if it's possible but haven't got time for a big trip as I want to go back to Burma too.

Thanks Somsai. When you said a VOA to China would be a big deal I rechecked what my friend actually said in his emails. I'm pretty sure he didn't have a Chinese visa beforehand. He hadn't even planned to go to Luang Nam Tha ... he only went there because he found LP to be a "tourist anthill"

I got an email from him in April saying he was in Dali which surprised me somewhat, so I asked him how on earth he'd managed to get into China without a pre-arranged visa.

He answered saying that two travel agents in Nam Tha told him that as a Canadian he could get a 30 day visa on arrival so he decided to try it. According to him the request did "catch the Chinese immigration people by surprise" and once the dust settled all he got was 2 weeks. He also mentions the stress of the bus driver trying to give him his fare back (6 times) and that the processing of his VOA held everyone up for an extra 15 minutes. It sounds like the bus driver didn't believe he'd get a VOA either!

I did a bit more searching just now and found this:

http://www.mekongtourism.org/site/resources/visa-info/china-visa-info/

No Chinese VOA anywhere except ...Boten? But who knows how reliable that is and maybe it only applies to certain nationals (like Canadians)?

Someone also said this on TT recently.

"At some points of entry under some conditions China does issue visas on arrival.

Last year, for example, Mohan issued 5155 visas to travellers from 24 countries, including 147 "L" visas, 36 "F" visas, 10 transit visas, and 396 group visas covering a total of 4962 travellers. And they've issued 2948 visas in the first half of 2009."

http://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/message.jspa?messageID=15924532

In Huay Xai there's a specialist travel agency for Xishuangbanna which claims that Boten is indeed a special case and that unlike anywhere else in China, one can get a visa on arrival there. Friends at Udomxai tourist department have since double checked with Chinese officials in Vientiane who suggest that it is 'better' to have a visa beforehand but that in principle it should be possible. Whether the Chinese border guards realise that they have this possibility is another question - sounds like the ideal time for someone to just go up and give it a go!
Would love to hear any concrete examples of anyone who had made it or actually failed to...
Cheers
Markbek