This will be posted on other branches, but I always get good advice here too.
Am at the position where i need to apply for an Iranian visa (holding a UK passport!). Keep meeting other Europeans (Swiss, French, Germans etc) who don't seem to have a problem applying at an Iranian embassy and then waiting to pick it up. For Brits I always heat rumours of Iranian visas being refused (often after a long wait and money paid with no refund). It therefore seems to make sense to use one of these travel agents to do the hard work in order to gurantee getting the visa.
Have heard reports from companies like Stantours, Persian voyages, magic carpet and Iranvisa. The first quotes a price of 100 UK pounds for their service, the last only 30 Euros. Such a huge price difference. For those who've visited Iran, with or without a UK passport, which company did you use and how were they? I don't plan to travel to Iran for another several months. Many thanks, Peter
I went last year on UK passport using iranianvisa.com and would recommend them, though have no info on the others.
With iranianvisa.com you only pay the 30Euro fee once you have been cleared/accepted by the MFA in Tehran, which as good as mans you have the visa. You pay the fee, get the authorisation code and go to the embassy of your choice to collect it (where you will pay a much bigger fee of course...).
The only sting for us was that apparently the MFA asked for proof we were students suspected we might be journalists of worse) so we had to scan student cards and e-mail them to the agents for which we were charged an additional 15Euro each "document handling charge". I am a bit suspicious if this was genuine or not, who knows. Other Europeans dont seem to have been asked similar stuff.
Even with this it was till cheaper than being refused after paying the full application fee or using other agents.
Heard keys2persia gave duff advice to some people, other said they were good.
Enjoy Iran
Robin
One thing I have found, is that advice on agencies goes out of date very quickly. A success story with an agency from last year, doesn't nescessarily carry over to the next year. Likewise, last years bad agency may now be the best one for applying. My experience with IranianVisa wasn't just a case of E30 unfortunately. I was required to go on a very expensive (several hundred Euros) tour for 7 nights, as the conditions for visa issue and the door to obtain onward independent travel in the country. No way around it (despite attempts). Yet, other people managed to get one through the same agency while others speak of having the same experience I did. How can anybody really know what is happening? At the end of the day, I don't think anybody will ever know for sure if it is the MFA taking a dislike to somebodys face in the scan of their passport page, or them making the mistake of putting somewhere unusual like Qom or an obscure north Iranian village on their 'tourist' itinerary when it should have just been Esfahan and Shiraz, or the applicants profession raising eyebrows at the MFA, or just plain old scams in operation by the agencys themsleves. Obtaining visas for Iran will probably always be a case of sheer gambling it seems.
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