TotallyOz Posted June 1, 2012 Posted June 1, 2012 I went to San Francisco right before my trip to get a Visa to India. Since my ID is from New York, they would not process my application. It was a wasted trip for me but I did get to drive up PC1 and had a lovely trip. However, I was not happy to drive to SF and at 9AM the consulate would not even see me. I had two choices, I could either fly to New York and do the same thing in New York or I could take a chance and try Bangkok as I already had my ticket to Bangkok. I chose the Bangkok option. The process is clearly laid out for all on the Indian Embassy of Bangkok's website. Make sure that every field is clearly answered. If no answer put NA. Once you fill out everything on that application you take the application to Sumkumvit 25, 1 Glas House Building and 15th Floor. They will make sure all if fill out correctly, that you have 2 passport photos (be sure they are good or they will send you out to make new ones), a copy of your passport and the application. You will have someone check all this info, get a ticket to meet with an Immigration Expert. If filled out properly, there should be no issues. You pay the fee around 3,000 baht and are told a decision will be made in 6 days. They issue for Visas for 6 months. They do NOT issue the 5 or 10 year Tourist Visa at this embassy. If you want that, go to the embassy in your home country. They say to check their website to see if it is ready but it was never online and it didn't even show up online when it was ready. So, don't waste your time with the online, just go to the place after 6 days. They tell everyone not to get a plane ticket to India until you get the visa. I followed that advice but it ended up costing me much more money. We had to book Thai Air and we spent 34,000 baht for each of us for Business Class. We could have gotten Jet Air for around 22,000 but those tickets were not available last minute. Quote
TotallyOz Posted June 1, 2012 Author Posted June 1, 2012 Sorry, almost forgot. The other option which I didn't talk about is there are services in USA that will take the passport and application and walk it though for you. AABriggs is the one I talked to. They said I could ship passport to them via Fed. Ex. and they will do the foot work and then ship back Fed Ex. If I had issues in Bangkok, this was going to be what I had to do. I just hated shipping a passport overseas or for that matter even in the USA. It was not what I wanted but I have many friends who have used them and were very happy with the service and never had one issue. Quote
Rogie Posted June 1, 2012 Posted June 1, 2012 That six-day wait for them to process a visa in Bangkok is most inconvenient to everybody unless you actually live there. Knowing the system at the Myanmar Embassy in Bkk I was happy to pay 2,500 baht to a travel agent and leave it all up to him. I went away to Hua Hin for a few days and picked it up on my return. I would do something similar if I was intending to visit India, or any other country requiring a visa in my passport before arrival in the country. When I am in the UK, as I do not live in London and that's where most consulates and embassies are located, I always use a visa service. Two I have used are Travcour and Trailfinders. Both are based in London so all I have to do is post my passport and the relevant document and fee and it's returned asap. On more than one occasion I have been intending to visit two or even three countries on one trip, so provided you start the ball rolling in plenty of time, it doesn't matter if the whole process takes 2 or 3 weeks, just sit back and let them do all the hard work. I always use the most secure way of posting my passport, but even so I acknowledge it could go missing, but so far despite doing it many times it never has. Quote