In December 2017, my boyfriend and I went on 5-month trip to South-Africa and neighbouring countries. As EU citizens you receive a 90 days visitors' visa on arrival valid for 90 days. Since our plan was to start and our trip in South Africa, we applied for a tourist visa extension. In theory it is possible to apply for a tourist extension, in practice is seemed impossible. We spoke with several people with the same problem. Below you can find some important information regarding a tourist visa and the application process for an extension.
Our experience with applying for a tourist visa extension
Being both Dutch citizens with EU passports we have received a 90 days visitors' visa on arrival valid for 90 days. However, these 90 days do not cover the full length of our intended stay counting from the first entry date into South Africa. Therefore, we have applied for an extension of our visa directly after our initial arrival into South Africa in the beginning of December 2017. The South African embassy in the Netherlands informed us that we should apply for extension at a regional department of home affairs. When we arrived here we were informed that we should file this via VFS since home affairs outsourced their Visa and Passport Application Services to VFS. This is when we tried to schedule an appointment, after applying online, with VFS in Cape Town which entailed a 60-days waiting period, hence we visited VFS on the earliest possibility in the middle of February 2018. Here we were informed that the remainder of the application process will take another 8-10 weeks. Meaning that the total application procedure of VFS takes longer than the 90-day validity of your visa. VFS blames home affairs for the delay and home affairs told us that they cannot do anything since the outsourced the visa extension to VFS. We are now 6 months further and back in the Netherlands, and still didn’t heard anything from VFS.
Problems with applying for an extension via VFS.
South Africa’s home affairs outsourced their visa processes to VFS. VFS Global is visa application service company, recently related to a corruption scandal in South Africa: http://www.tourismupdate.co.za/article/108549/New-visa-regime-s-astonishing-link-to-Guptas-Parliament-hears For the services of VFS you need to pay 2700 rand and 400 rand per person for the visa itself. Our advice is to not apply for an tourist extension with the VFS. It is probably not worth your money and energy.
• The total VFS application process (filling out online application form at VFS + 60 days waiting period for an appointment at VFS facilitation centre + 8-10 weeks until the visa is granted) takes longer then the duration of the initial visa (90 days)
• You must collect your visa in the same office as you filed the application. Although the Manager of the Cape Town office told us that we can also pick up the visa in another local VFS office, this is not the case. Meaning you need to travel at least two times to the same city to file and collect your visa.
• VFS advised us to stay in South Africa till we receive our visa extension. If we followed their advice we would get an overstay ban which can vary from 1-5 years since we still didn’t receive our visa (after 6 months).
Alternatives
The easiest solution to prevent being longer in South Africa than 90-days. For example, you can start in Windhoek, Namibia and depart from Cape Town. Below you can find two other alternatives if you need to be more than 90-days in South Africa.
Visa-run to a non-neighbouring country
The only guarantee for a new entry stamp is to travel back to your home country. Previous it was possible to do a visa-run to a neighbouring country such as Swaziland. This seems no longer possible, unless you are lucky at the border. The other alternative is that you travel to a non-neighbouring country such as Zambia. Although you have a higher change to get a new visa compared to travelling to a neighbouring country, there are mixed stories whether this works or not. Again, it seems you have to be lucky if you cross the border.
Re-enter 7 days before you flight departures
South Africa is an easy and popular starting/ending point of a longer trip to Southern Africa. If you stay longer than 90 days in Africa and you flight arrives and departs from Cape Town or Johannesburg, you can also choose to re-enter South Africa 7-days before you flight departs.
Be careful with your tourist visa on arrival
Based on stories from other European travellers you should also be aware that:
• Your 90-day visa on arrival starts at the moment that you arrive in South Africa, if you go in the meantime to another country it doesn’t mean that your 90 days stops and continues when you re-enter South Africa
• Be careful at the border and check your passport if you have a transit to another country. We met people that got a normal visa instead of a transit visa meaning that they couldn’t re-enter South Africa.
• The expire day in your passport is the date that you already should have left the country. Make sure you leave South Africa at least on day before the expire date in your passport.
• If your initial visa is expired, you should get a 7-day transit/temporary visa to re-enter South Africa to catch your flight or the pick up your extension.
