Russia
How obtain the vise to Russia with the easiest and economic way
Processing the visa to travel to Russia (whether for tourism, business or study purposes) is not as complicated a process as it may seem. In this article I explain how you can manage it more quickly on your own by collecting all the necessary documentation electronically from your computer in 1 hour, and how it can be cheaper.
This article is in permanent update. It was originally published on December 10, 2014 and has been updated on June 24, 2018 to introduce the latest news
In this video I summarize the main thing of this guide and I explain to you step by step how to obtain the documentation to obtain the visa online in less than 15 minutes: Video
INTRODUCTION
On several occasions I had to arrange tourist visas to travel to Russia for family and friends. The process of visa management in Russia continues to be excessively bureaucratic, thanks to which many companies have taken advantage of to do business.
In any case, despite the procedures that must be performed, it is not a very complicated process if you decide to do it on your own. Therefore, in this article I will try to explain it in the clearest and simplest way possible (if you also need to process the visa to China I also explain it in detail in this article: How to process the tourist visa to China - you can already transact online under certain requirements-).
The information available on the Internet on how to carry out Russian visa management, both that provided by official bodies and the one that can be read in some travelers' blogs that have completed the process, always generates doubts in some points:
The most controversial issue is obtaining the so-called visa support (or letter of invitation), which I will explain later. It is a document that should be obtained for free but for which you can get to charge more than 50 euros. Below I explain how you can get it electronically in 5 minutes for 15-18 euros.
Another issue that generates many doubts are the visa processing areas: Is it obligatory to do so with the authorized Russian Central Visa company or can I go to the consular offices of the Russian Federation in Madrid and Barcelona?
What information should I include in the "Tourist Company" section of the visa application form?
Where do I get travel medical insurance quickly and cheaply online and with coverage in Russia?
In this article I try to answer these and many other questions, with the aim of making it as simple, fast and economical to obtain the visa to Russia on your own (both tourist, as business or studies). Collecting and completing all the documentation can take approximately 1 hour.
Important previous notes:
If you are going to travel to Russia as a tourist through an organized trip with a travel agency, it is most likely that the agency itself is responsible for carrying out the visa process and will only ask for the necessary documentation. If you travel on your own you can also go to a travel agency for them to do the procedure, yes, the cost will be significantly higher than if you process it on your own.
This article is focused on citizens residing in Spain who are going to travel to Russia, however, if you are Mexican and resident in Mexico, this article will also be useful to you, although in this case there are mainly two differences: the first, that the process must be done in person at the Russian Embassy in Mexico (located in Mexico City) and, secondly, that between the documentation you must not provide travel medical insurance but the passage indicating the dates of entry and exit from Russia in the case of the tourist visa. The rest of the documentation is the same as indicated in this article: visa support, visa application questionnaire, original passport, photo, etc.
Without a visa, holders of passports from the following Spanish speaking countries can enter Russia (for stays up to 90 days): Argentina, Venezuela, Colombia, Nicaragua, Peru, Chile, Uruguay and Ecuador. Holders of Cuban passports can also enter without a visa (for stays up to 30 days).
1. PREVIOUS ISSUES
Before going into detail about the process of processing the visa to Russia, it is necessary to answer a series of previous questions to better understand the procedure.
1.1. What is the visa and who should apply?
The visa is only an authorization for entry, stay or transit in the territory of the Russian Federation by citizens of other nationalities. It is a document that is placed in the passport like the one you can see in the image at the beginning of this article.
If you are Spanish you need to obtain a visa to travel to Russia. However, some nationalities with which Russia has bilateral agreements are exempt from processing the visa. For example, without a visa, holders of ordinary passports of countries of the former USSR such as Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Ukraine, etc. can enter the territory of Russia, in the same way that Spaniards can travel without a visa to the other countries of The EU.
If you are of a different nationality than the Spanish one, you can consult the list of countries that do not need a visa to travel to Russia in this link.
1.2. What types of visa exist?
Depending on the object of entry to the Russian Federation, 7 types of visas are issued:
Tourist visa (current article). It is the most usual and as its name indicates is issued for tourist stays for a maximum of 30 days.
Business visa. To stay.
Advantage
The only advantage of managing your visa in any of the consular offices is that it is a little cheaper. The normal processing of a visa costs 35 euros (compared to the 58 euros it costs at the Russian Visa Central), while the urgent processing costs 70 euros (113 euros at the Russian Visa Central). You save 23 euros of management costs in the normal processing and 43 euros in the urgent processing.
Disadvantages
The processing must be in person in Madrid or Barcelona (you can not perform the processing by courier service)
It is essential to have a prior appointment and, depending on the time of year, may take a while:
Request for a prior appointment in Madrid: http://madrid.kdmid.ru/
Request for a prior appointment in Barcelona: http://barcelona.kdmid.ru/
Only one visa is processed per appointment. In the case of registration of several members of a family, each one must request an appointment and register individually. For this reason travel agencies do not process visas in the consular sections.
Hours reduced attention during the week from 10.00 to 13.00.
Note: Consular Sections do not open the Russian holidays (you can check them on the website of the Russian Consulate in Spain). In contrast, all holidays in Spain are working days (including holidays in August, Christmas or Easter) if they do not coincide with Russian holidays. You can take advantage of these festive dates in Spain to go to the consulate to process your visa.
Option 2: Central Russian Visa
Central Office of Russian Visas in Barcelona
Offices of the Russian Visa Central
During the last years the number of visas to Russia processed in Spain has experienced a great increase. Due to this, and in order to speed up procedures, in December 2010 the authorization for the management and processing of visas to Russia was awarded to the Russian Visa Central, an entity managed by the private company Twim Inversiones 2008 S.L.
Since then, the Russian Visa Center is the authorized agency for the process of obtaining a visa to travel to Russia:
It has offices in Madrid (Calle Príncipe de Vergara 126, bajo, 28002, telephones 902 17 27 77 and 91 563 24 00) and Barcelona (Avenida Roma 67, bajo, 08029, telephones 902 19 29 30 and 93 321 69 36)
Website: http://www.centraldevisadosrusos.com
The consular sections themselves recommend on their website to manage visas in the Russian Visa Center, in this way they try to lighten their workload.
The rest of web pages that you can find online in which they offer visa processing to Russia, are NOT AUTHORIZED AGENCIES, but private companies that act as intermediaries and charge additional management costs for the visa process.
Advantage
The processing can be either in person in Madrid or Barcelona or remotely through the courier service of the visa center
No appointment is necessary, just go with all the documentation to one of the offices to complete the process (or send by courier)
Hours of service to the wider public: from Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. for the reception of documentation for processing and information (and from 3 to 5 p.m. for collection of issued visas)
You can process at the same time the number of visas you need (yours and those of your family or friends)
In their offices they have computers in which to fill out the application form and they can explain how to fill it out
Disadvantages
In exchange for a better service, the price of processing the visa is also higher. The normal processing of a visa costs 58 euros (35 euros of the consular fees plus 23 euros of management costs applied by the Russian visa center). They act as intermediaries between the applicant and the consular section, receiving the documentation and sending it to the consular section for processing.
I have always processed visas at the Russian Visa Central through the messaging service, mostly because I live in Valencia and it is a problem to have to travel to the consular section of Madrid or Barcelona since they do not offer the service of sending documentation by courier. Although both the medical insurance and the letter of invitation I process it on my own (I explain below how).
Processing the visa to travel to Russia (whether for tourism, business or study purposes) is not as complicated a process as it may seem. In this article I explain how you can manage it more quickly on your own by collecting all the necessary documentation electronically from your computer in 1 hour, and how it can be cheaper.
In this video I summarize the main thing of this guide and I explain to you step by step how to obtain the documentation to obtain the visa online in less than 15 minutes: Video
INTRODUCTION
On several occasions I had to arrange tourist visas to travel to Russia for family and friends. The process of visa management in Russia continues to be excessively bureaucratic, thanks to which many companies have taken advantage of to do business.
In any case, despite the procedures that must be performed, it is not a very complicated process if you decide to do it on your own. Therefore, in this article I will try to explain it in the clearest and simplest way possible (if you also need to process the visa to China I also explain it in detail in this article: How to process the tourist visa to China - you can already transact online under certain requirements-).
The information available on the Internet on how to carry out Russian visa management, both that provided by official bodies and the one that can be read in some travelers' blogs that have completed the process, always generates doubts in some points:
The most controversial issue is obtaining the so-called visa support (or letter of invitation), which I will explain later. It is a document that should be obtained for free but for which you can get to charge more than 50 euros. Below I explain how you can get it electronically in 5 minutes for 15-18 euros.
Another issue that generates many doubts are the visa processing areas: Is it obligatory to do so with the authorized Russian Central Visa company or can I go to the consular offices of the Russian Federation in Madrid and Barcelona?
What information should I include in the "Tourist Company" section of the visa application form?
Where do I get travel medical insurance quickly and cheaply online and with coverage in Russia?
In this article I try to answer these and many other questions, with the aim of making it as simple, fast and economical to obtain the visa to Russia on your own (both tourist, as business or studies). Collecting and completing all the documentation can take approximately 1 hour.
Important previous notes:
If you are going to travel to Russia as a tourist through an organized trip with a travel agency, it is most likely that the agency itself is responsible for carrying out the visa process and will only ask for the necessary documentation. If you travel on your own you can also go to a travel agency for them to do the procedure, yes, the cost will be significantly higher than if you process it on your own.
This article is focused on citizens residing in Spain who are going to travel to Russia, however, if you are Mexican and resident in Mexico, this article will also be useful to you, although in this case there are mainly two differences: the first, that the process must be done in person at the Russian Embassy in Mexico (located in Mexico City) and, secondly, that between the documentation you must not provide travel medical insurance but the passage indicating the dates of entry and exit from Russia in the case of the tourist visa. The rest of the documentation is the same as indicated in this article: visa support, visa application questionnaire, original passport, photo, etc.
Without a visa, holders of passports from the following Spanish speaking countries can enter Russia (for stays up to 90 days): Argentina, Venezuela, Colombia, Nicaragua, Peru, Chile, Uruguay and Ecuador. Holders of Cuban passports can also enter without a visa (for stays up to 30 days).
1. PREVIOUS ISSUES
Before going into detail about the process of processing the visa to Russia, it is necessary to answer a series of previous questions to better understand the procedure.
1.1. What is the visa and who should apply?
The visa is only an authorization for entry, stay or transit in the territory of the Russian Federation by citizens of other nationalities. It is a document that is placed in the passport like the one you can see in the image at the beginning of this article.
If you are Spanish you need to obtain a visa to travel to Russia. However, some nationalities with which Russia has bilateral agreements are exempt from processing the visa. For example, without a visa, holders of ordinary passports of countries of the former USSR such as Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Ukraine, etc. can enter the territory of Russia, in the same way that Spaniards can travel without a visa to the other countries of The EU.
If you are of a different nationality than the Spanish one, you can consult the list of countries that do not need a visa to travel to Russia in this link.
1.2. What types of visa exist?
Depending on the object of entry to the Russian Federation, 7 types of visas are issued:
Tourist visa (current article). It is the most usual and as its name indicates is issued for tourist stays for a maximum of 30 days.
Business visa. To stay.
Advantage
The only advantage of managing your visa in any of the consular offices is that it is a little cheaper. The normal processing of a visa costs 35 euros (compared to the 58 euros it costs at the Russian Visa Central), while the urgent processing costs 70 euros (113 euros at the Russian Visa Central). You save 23 euros of management costs in the normal processing and 43 euros in the urgent processing.
Disadvantages
The processing must be in person in Madrid or Barcelona (you can not perform the processing by courier service)
It is essential to have a prior appointment and, depending on the time of year, may take a while:
Request for a prior appointment in Madrid: http://madrid.kdmid.ru/
Request for a prior appointment in Barcelona: http://barcelona.kdmid.ru/
Only one visa is processed per appointment. In the case of registration of several members of a family, each one must request an appointment and register individually. For this reason travel agencies do not process visas in the consular sections.
Hours reduced attention during the week from 10.00 to 13.00.
Note: Consular Sections do not open the Russian holidays (you can check them on the website of the Russian Consulate in Spain). In contrast, all holidays in Spain are working days (including holidays in August, Christmas or Easter) if they do not coincide with Russian holidays. You can take advantage of these festive dates in Spain to go to the consulate to process your visa.
Option 2: Central Russian Visa
Central Office of Russian Visas in Barcelona
Offices of the Russian Visa Central
During the last years the number of visas to Russia processed in Spain has experienced a great increase. Due to this, and in order to speed up procedures, in December 2010 the authorization for the management and processing of visas to Russia was awarded to the Russian Visa Central, an entity managed by the private company Twim Inversiones 2008 S.L.
Since then, the Russian Visa Center is the authorized agency for the process of obtaining a visa to travel to Russia:
It has offices in Madrid (Calle Príncipe de Vergara 126, bajo, 28002, telephones 902 17 27 77 and 91 563 24 00) and Barcelona (Avenida Roma 67, bajo, 08029, telephones 902 19 29 30 and 93 321 69 36)
Website: http://www.centraldevisadosrusos.com
The consular sections themselves recommend on their website to manage visas in the Russian Visa Center, in this way they try to lighten their workload.
The rest of web pages that you can find online in which they offer visa processing to Russia, are NOT AUTHORIZED AGENCIES, but private companies that act as intermediaries and charge additional management costs for the visa process.
Advantage
The processing can be either in person in Madrid or Barcelona or remotely through the courier service of the visa center
No appointment is necessary, just go with all the documentation to one of the offices to complete the process (or send by courier)
Hours of service to the wider public: from Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. for the reception of documentation for processing and information (and from 3 to 5 p.m. for collection of issued visas)
You can process at the same time the number of visas you need (yours and those of your family or friends)
In their offices they have computers in which to fill out the application form and they can explain how to fill it out
Disadvantages
I have always processed visas at the Russian Visa Central through the messaging service, mostly because I live in Valencia and it is a problem to have to travel to the consular section of Madrid or Barcelona since they do not offer the service of sending documentation by courier. Although both the medical insurance and the letter of invitation I process it on my own (I explain below how).
Russia
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