Visa Registration
Hi,Please adivse me on visa registration and excuse me from being tedious by first setting out my itinerary:
Day 1 (Sunday) arrival in Moscow, staying in a hotel.
Day 2 check out from the hotel in the morning and take the night train to St Petersburg arriving there in the following morning
Day 3 check into a hotel in St Petersburg
Days 4-5, staying in the same hotel in St Petersburg
Day 6 check out from the St Petersburg hotel and take a day train back to Moscow. Stay in a hotel for the night.
Days 7-8 leave Moscow for the Golden Ring towns, staying in a hotel in different towns.
Day 9 return to Moscow and stay in a hotel.
Day 10 (Tuesday) leave Russia.
My questions are:
1. As I shall stay more than 7 business days (I believe Saturdays are counted as a business day) in Russia, I shall be required to register on arrival in Russia and this will be done by the hotel in Moscow? Is this correct?
2. If so, will the registration cover my entire stay in Russia or just for my first stay in Moscow, which is for 2 days?
3. If the registration only covers my first stay in Moscow (which is for 2 days), shall I have to register again in St Petersburg, then the Golden Ring towns and on return to Moscow on Day 9?
4. Any need to register for the night travelling on the train from Moscow to St Petersburg?
5. If I am required to register again every time when I arrive in a new city, shall I be required to show to the hotel my previous registration slip? If so, will the slip be returned to me so that on departure at the Moscow airport I shall be able to produce a bundle of registration slips to account for my movements within Russia?
Your help will be greatly appreciated.
1
I believe that you only need to get the registration done once. Moscow may be awkward because you'll arrive on a Sunday, it sometimes takes them more than a day.We registered on the 6th day in Russia in Rostov veliky, our hotel did it for us. Due to having been in Moscow on a weekend and our hostel in St petersburg being unable to do the registration this was the only option. We never had to register again over the next two weeks.
2
1; The law on registration is very clear a hotel must register your stay within 24 hours, forget the 7 day rule it doesn't apply in when staying in hotels. Saturday isn't a working day as a rule but some Saturdays are.2; No
3; The hotel will register you again in St Petersburg and any other hotel you stay in.
4; No
5; Hotels won't as a rule ask to see them, but each time you are registered you'll be given the tear off potion of the registration form. It is possible you could be asked to produce these when leaving Russia, but I've never been asked and those I know who have tried to hand them over at passport control say they simply were not interested.
4
Thanks folks.In reply to michaeldunha, I'm planning on arriving in Moscow on 5 May 2013, which is a Sunday. As jeraboa says, it being a Sunday, it may present some problems, particularly that I shall leave Moscow in the evening on Monday. How soon does registration get completed?
5
Chatswood,9 May is the Victory Day, a national holiday in Russia. So most probably 9, 10 and 11 will be days-off, while Sunday 12 will be a working day.
Anyway all your anxiety is useless because it is not your duty to be registered, but your hosts'. In your case, hotels are normally accredited with the FMS and will do that automatically on the day of check-in.
6
the actual rule is that unless you stay for more than 7 days in one place during your stay in Russia, you will never have to register. Plain and easy that is the rule. That said I have experienced once in provincial Russia that I hotel would not accept me as guest as I had staid for more than 7 days in Russia without having any registration. What I did was to go to the next hotel that accdepted me without any questions. You will not experience this problem in Moscow or St Petersburg. When exiting Russia you will not have a problem with this, simply because they know the rules: - unless you stay 7 days or more in one place (hotel that is, not city) you don't have to register.May be you could consider to fly in to St Petersburg (Moscow) and out of Moscow (St Petersburg) meaning that you can reduce the time spent on the train.
Have a nice trip,
Jan
