Well what a few days its been for many of our and other tour operators passengers looking forward to a trip of a lifetime in China. Last week inexplicably China authorities started refusing UK citizens entry into China at Beijing airport.
Many passengers arrived into Beijing wishing to purchase a 144 hour visa is advertised on the Chinese Embassy. This is to be done at the airport but for some reason rules must have changed and many were refused entry. As you can imagine this caused huge stress as some flew back to the UK or some of our customers had to purchase a flight to Japan and join the Quantum of the Seas a few days later. All this at their own expense!
Reports are that the issue was if your passport had a Turkish or UAE stamp in it but thats not been confirmed. As it is one of customers got through, and she confirmed that she had both a Turkish and UAE stamp in her passport!!! So nobody really knows……maybe she was just lucky. Queues at the airport were taking up to 5 hours which is ridiculous!
Customers who had purchased a full visa seem to have been fine so I suppose the best and only advice I can give you is to get a full visa. Yes it will cost you more but i’m sure you will agree its worth it.
ABTA tried to get involved and seek information but that info wasn’t forthcoming and they issued the following stateroom :
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So ABTA are just giving the same advice, get a FULL VISA!!
We’ve helped as many of our customers as we can getting them to Japan so their holiday isn’t completely ruined, but all are all are a little out of pocket having to pay for flights and hotels.
Hopefully the Chinese Embassy will confirm soon what the issue is with the 144 hour on arrival visa or remove it completely so customers know where they stand. Otherwise tourism will suffer in the end.
Any questions please contact me.
Take Care, Haydn.
About Me
Hello everyone, My name is Haydn , I live in Caerphilly South Wales with my wife and 2 young sons. I have been in the Travel Industry for just over 23 years now, specializing in cruising for the last 13 years. I have been on a variety of Cruise ships,…
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