Urgent!! visa for Vietnam. Does anyone know what happens if you fly into Ho Chi Minh without a "Letter of Approval"????

Our Thai office can get you a visa within 5 working days.

with express fees I got 30 day visa between 24 hours in wireless road in Bangkok. if you live far fm BKK try google, there are few good companies in Vietnam and you can applay for a e-visa ..... certain shorter then 5 days

You need an approval letter otherwise they won't let you out of the airport as you won't have a visa. You can do it online and have it done in 24 hours for a little bit extra. The site I used was https://secure.vietnam-visa.com/apply.html and it will be emailed to you as soon as it is done.

I went with "myvietnamvisa.com" and the turnaround was within 4-5 hours if you bust the extra $20 for same-day service. No reason to wait 24 hours or even 5 days!

The problem with the "letter of approval" visa-on-arrival scheme is that it exposes your personal information to strangers.

Each day, the companies like MyVietamVisa send a batch of names to the Immigration Department. The department receives dozens of requests from many companies each day. All the names from each company are handled with one letter.

That one letter of approval is sent back to all the people who applied that day, meaning your full name, birthdate, country, passport number and general travel dates are shared with the half dozen or so other strangers who also asked for the letter that day from that company.

Had I known my sensitive personal information was going to be shared with seven or eight strangers, I would not have opted for the visa-on-arrival method.

I would have taken the time to walk my paperwork through the Vietnamese embassy myself.

Getting the visa yourself is a hassle, takes at least two visits and costs more. But is the convenience of the visa-on-arrival deal worth the risk of identity theft?

So be warned: If you use this visa-on-arrival method, you will be sharing your valuable personal information with strangers.

It's time Vietnam streamlined and modernized its immigration processes with a regard for the secure transmission of private information in the age of the Internet.

^ If you are paranoid about some strangers seeing your passport number and date of birth, you must be absolutely apoplectic when you consider every Tom, Dick, Harry (and Mary) that has ever copied your passport details at airport check-in, hotel check-in, car rental pick-up, etc..

To the OP, I have used stayinvietnam.com several times over several years, as have several of my co-workers and nobody so far has had anything 'stolen' from their basic traveling identity. Visa invite letter is usually available via email within 24-hours, even quicker if you make a lot of noise. The airline will not let you board the Vietnam-bound flight without the letter, never mind getting as far as Hanoi or Saigon.

PS. I sometimes hand out other people's unwanted or old business cards to annoying people I can't be bothered with that insist on giving me their business cards. Am I protecting my identity or abusing other peoples identity?