Hello - We plan to travel to St Petersberg for 4 nights and Moscow for 3 nights in late May 2010. I have contacted the company White Nights twice and have not had response (once via the form on their website and once directly via email). I had read they were recommended along with WaytoRussia (although I can only find negative reviews on tripadvisor forum for them).
Can anyone recommend any companies to use for visa help? Thanks!
You can no longer mail the application yourself. Go to http://www.russianembassy.org/ and click on "tourist visa" on the middle top right. There are step by step instructions there.
Ali,
are the agencies recommended by the Russian embassy. Take your pick.
Thanks Tom - the first one looks to be a good option.
I can't get it myself since the closest consulate is in New York City and my boyfriend and I aren't married and cannot both get to the city.
Thanks Steve...unless I'm reading it wrong you cannot mail directly to the consulates any longer and have to do in person which is why I'm looking for a service to do it on my behalf.
Just to sort of close this out for those searching the helpline with similar questions. I actually contacted www.travisarussia.com to obtain our visas. They have been great answering all my questions promptly. The process is relatively straight-forward. I booked my hotels and obtained the appropriate documentation within a couple days, spent 15 minutes on our applications, went and got new passport photos and then printed the documents and sent out Tuesday. I received confirmation Travisa received our documents and passports today and they are processing at the consulate shortly.
This just reiterates something I learned in the past. Most of Europe is relatively easy to navigate without the help of a travel agent. Russia is the exception... (well, OK, Belarus and some of the Caucus nations too). Let the professionals help you with this one.
Just to officially close out the process for anyone doing a search on the forum...
Sent my passports/paperwork to Travisa on 2/23, they received on 2/25 and we received our passports w/Visas today. We paid for the 4-20 business day timing and they did it in 9 business days (technically 8 if you don't count 3/8 as the embassy was closed for International Women's Day). We received email confirmations at each step (receipt, processing, shipped) and they answered any questions I had in between (within a couple hours usually). If I had to use a service again I wouldn't hesitate to use them.
Thank you for the recommendation. I need to get a visa a was debating going to San Francisco to apply in person. I think I will just use the travisa instead.
