How to make inpossible possible and get Russian Visa in one week and 5 steps

Step by step

When we started thinking about our trip to Murmansk, firstly we wanted to  gather knowledge about the Russian visa. Travelling within the Schengen area made us to forget that crossing the country’s border is connected with formalities.

Once we have gathered practical knowledge about the Russian visa, we are happy to share it with you. We have an experience with The Consular Section of the Russian Embassy in Warsaw.

Let’s start

There are two ways to get the visa:

• more expensive – using the services of a visa agency
  
• cheaper – requires some effort, but gives a lot of satisfaction and leaves more money in your pocket

Below we will describe the second one 🙂

What is needed to procure a Russian visa then? Three things:

• an appointment at The Consular Section of the Russian Embassy with all the required documents
  
• PLN 150
  
• some time

You can schedule your appointment here.

What do you need to bring at the appointment?

• Your visa application – it will be generated during the booking of your visit
• A passport – the expiry date must be at least 180 days later than your planned return from Russia
• A health insurance confirmation for the amount of 30,000 EUR. Important point – the Europe policy is not enough, it must be marked that it applies to the European part of Russia.
• The expiry date of the passport must be 6 months longer than our return from Russia
• A photo – in accordance with the guidelines (in fact the guidelines are inconsistent, the main point is that the head in the picture is supposed to be 3 cm high)
• A voucher

The voucher

The voucher is a document issued by one of the official Russian tourism companies, certifying that we have booked accommodation for our trip. If you are procuring the visa by yourself, you also have to get a voucher by yourself.
We found a company in Saint Petersburg that offers vouchers to booking.com customers
That means you have to click the reservation through their affiliate link, fill in the form, wait 24 hours and an email will come with a very nice PDF that contains the voucher. 

Some information about the dates

• The insurance must cover the entire planned period of stay in Russia
• Date range of the visa must be exactly the same as the dates from the voucher
• 2 weeks after submitting the visa application, your visa is ready

Additional information

Every person traveling to Russia needs a separate appointment at 
The Consular Section. If you need a visa for the kids under 13 their presence is not required, but the visit must be booked anyway.

BTW – Jump to Norway for a moment

We wanted to jump to Norway for a few hours – that’s why we originally applied for a double entry visa. Unfortunately, the Russian system does not provide such idea of  departure and return to Russia on the same day. If we had booked a place in Norway for one night, our plan would have a chance to come to succeed.