15 day visa stamp extension and vec..

Hi Waldo0. Sorry for the late reply to you. If you've already departed for the

"Land Of Smiles " ™, I hope all goes well there in the interim.

So, smart idea was make new passport in Finland while I was there and save money as embassy in Hanoi takes hefty fee for it and then enter vietnam with 15 day stamp and apply new VEC,...

May I assume that the source of your VEC trouble is due to your having been issued your new passport? By this I mean that your Visa Exemption Certificate was tied to your old passport (and by extension, of course, tied to the old passport number) and now that the old passport has been cancelled there is no record of the new pp having been granted the VEC. I recently helped a fellow Canadian with precisely that issue, and what a stressful and expensive 3 day affair it was for him.

...well I went imigration and they said if they put new VEC I still have to leave and thete will be overstay.. as my visa stamp runs out today, but returning today with new form AN5 to get extension to that 15days they told me that there will be no overstay if they take my application today? this seems odd for what I have read? Meaning if extension is applied if visa runs out there will be overstay fine given..?

My understanding of applications for these sort of extensions is that if you apply for the extension while your 15 day Vietnam Visa Exemption (not to be confused with your Visa Exemption Certificate (VEC)) is still valid, that there will be no overstay fee charged should it expire whilst your extension application is processing. If you managed to get the AN5 (as you stated) submitted today, you should be able to avoid the overstay charge.

second is that they said in order to use VEC I have to fly out of the country and re-enter it to be valid.
other option is to fly today Thailand and apply VEC from there..
-@Wald0

I'm assuming, as I have little experience dealing with the 15 day Vietnam Visa Exemption/Visa Waiver/Visa Free stamp, that this is due to that stamp not being convertible to a Visa Exemption Certificate (VEC) while still in VN.

But why "fly out", I wonder? Did the immigration officer say that a land crossing outbound was not permissible? To the best of my recollection, these "fly out" directives have been reported by members who are already in an overstayed status which you have indicated you are not.

Please let us know how this all works out for you. We'd very much appreciate it, and good luck.

@Aidan in HCMC

yes, got new passport and old one got cancelled,

but today was luckyday, they did take both applications, AN5 and VEC application and said no need to fly or pay any overstay fees.

althought… I was tempted to do so but wife was with me… 😅 so no luck tell home “unbelievable, they make me fly to bkk! See you in 7 days…”

and yes, normally I have just got new passport here and then apply new VEC, I also got told that with E visa would have resulted me to have to fly out and return with VEC, same as I got told if I would just apply VEC while I was in my visa stamp.

they also wanted to see my original marriage certificate..  but got past that by been nice. (Always been using photocopy and having that translated and notarized) some russian next counter was not that lucky

@Aidan in HCMC

well fly out is so much more convenient while in Hanoi plus got friends in bkk so all better 😅

When you get a new passport from the US, they give you back your old one with a hole punched in the corner through the whole book.   When I renewed mine while I was in Vietnam, my VEC and associated stamps were in the old passport.   I had to carry both for a while but It was not nearly as bad as having to start from scratch.   At time it seems to many Americans that our country can't get anything right, but they seem to be doing passport renewals in an uncharacteristically intelligent way.