Hi all,
We will be traveling to Tanzania in a couple of weeks and plan to get our visas upon arrival at Kilimanjaro airport. We know it costs $100 per person for the visa for US citizens. We plan on using $20 bills dated 2013. Theses are bills that have obviously been circulated but are in good condition - clean, no tears. Will these be accepted or do we need uncirculated bills in $50 or $100 denominations. Thanks.
Did you read somewhere that the bills had meet certain requirements?
Actually I have read conflicting info in a few places. Our tour operator says the bills have to be newer than 2005 and crisp, clean, new bills. In the latest guidebooks, it says the bills have to be issued after 2006 but nothing else. I have also seen conflicting reports on forums about what denominations to use for the visa. Some say $50 and some say $100. I have checked with the Tanzania embassy website and they state how much the visa is but nothing about denominations or dates on the currency. I was hoping for some boots on the ground info. I know we ran into a similar situation in Peru where US cash has to be crisp and clean with no tears, folds, etc. or they won't be accepted.
Wherever you bank, they should be able to supply you with new, crisp, unused, direct from the Fed, bills. You just have to ask and make sure you specify "newer than 20xx" or whatever you need because they might have crispy unused bills but they might be from earlier date wise. They may have to order them special, so you might not be able to get them right away but definitely within a week (and there should be no service charge for this if you have a good bank).
Take a mix of $20, $50, and $100 so you can pay for each visa in whatever mix they prefer. Better to be over prepared than to be refused for a small detail such as not having the right denomination bill.
Go to your bank and ask for new $100 bills. They may accept $20 bills, but as a general rule $50 and $100 bills are preferred for these types of transactions.
Thanks all for your replies. I bank at a credit union and have been to all the share cooperative branches in the area and the best they could do was to give me 2013 $20. notes. These notes are in good condition - no tears, no writing on them, pretty crisp. They could not get me uncirculated new bills. The banks that I do not have an account with in the area would not help me because I am not a customer. I spoke to the tour company and they said the notes that I obtained would work for the visas. If any of you have been to Tanzania and and have actual experience obtaining your visa upon arrival in that country, I would appreciate your input.
Mary, our adult daughter (who lived in Nairobi) and I flew from Nairobi to Zanzibar in 2011 and had no problems purchasing our visas with undamaged bills, using $50s, $20s and $10s but keep in mind that was 2011 and things could have changed. They didn't seem at all concerned with the age of the bills. Afterwards we had to use the money exchange company at the airport (for a small amount just to get to our hotel) because the atm supposedly wasn't working. It also didn't have a bank attached to it so I didn't trust it anyway.
Thanks, Darcy. That eases my mind. I believe the problem in Tanzania with using USD older than 2006 was that they were easy to counterfeit and hence suspect. I ran into a slightly similar problem in Peru where the USD had to be crisp, with no tears or writing on them or they would be refused. We are touring with a safari company that s picking us up at the airport so no worries with needing cash to get to the hotel. We also need to tip the guide and a little bit of money for incidentals such as souvenirs, drinks, etc.
Sounds like fun, Mary and a lot easier than when we did our trip independently.
Yes, it should be fun. We are really excited. We have had to do a bit more prep for this trip than for our trips to Europe - immunizations, clothing and luggage considerations, bug protection (antimalarials and Deet), camera gear weight. I'll post a brief trip report when we get back.
Just got back from Tanzania. Newer, "pristine" bills with NO marks or tears are important in Kenya and Tanzania. If you change cash, you will get a better exchange rate with the larger bills. Also, we were told that newer bills are better because there were a lot of counterfeit bills circulating a number of years ago. We wished that we had brought more pristine ones and fives for tips. I don't think we ever changed money while we were there, though! Every place in Kenya took U.S. money and many places in Tanzania as well.
Our vaccination certificates were checked at that airport.
Tim,
We did not have to show vaccination certificates at the airport in Tanzania. Were you coming in from a country with yellow fever such as Kenya? Re: currency - we had newer than 2006 issue US bills with us and these were accepted as long as they had no tears or marks on them. They did have some folds and were obviously not straight from the mint.
Very recently at Dar es Salaam airport I paid my Visa by credit card and by Euro. Other airports may still insist on cash, and cash only in US $ and in new banknotes in reasonable condition.
ATMs are ubiquitous and operate 24/7. The local currency is convertible. There is no more black market exchange rate and no more hyperinflation. You don't get better value when paying or tipping in american dollars, cigarettes or chewing gum. Hence there is no point to bring dollars or traveller checks. Banks have limited hours, i.e. Monday tp Friday 9:00-16:00 minus lunchtime break and apply a lot of bureaucracy, i.e. photocopy passport, fill out forms, enter data into computer etc..
For ultimate flexibility and longer stays get a local SIM card and register with M-PESA, a payment service via mobile phones which is popular in the entire region.
Hi Zappp,
We landed in Arusha which is a very small airport so we were not given an option to pay with a credit card. We used US dollars to pay for our visas. Dar Es Salaam is a much bigger, more modern, more cosmopolitan city so perhaps that might be why you could pay with a cc. And you are correct that there are atm's in cities which we used to obtain the local currency. But there are no atm's in the bush. Our credit card was accepted in all the hotels with one exception. The internet connection at the hotel in the Serengeti went down and we needed to pay our bar bill in cash before we checked out. Luckily we had cash. Again - no atm in the bush. It's always a good idea to have cash on hand.
