When does a trip to India become a trip to Hong Kong? When you run into a visa problem

Question: We recently traveled to India. We were denied boarding our flight from LAX to New Delhi because we didn’t have an email confirmation code for our visa application. We had the printout of the application form that included our uploaded photos, but somehow we never received a confirmation code by email. We were given the option of staying in Los Angeles or taking our first leg to Hong Kong and sorting it out there. We chose Hong Kong because there is an Indian consulate there, and there is not one in L.A. Between losing hotel nights in India, the money for a visa service, paying a flight change fee and more, we spent a lot of money to fix this. When we were in the immigration area of the New Delhi Airport we noticed that there was a separate line for visa on arrival. Could we have obtained a visa on arrival and avoided all the extra hassle and expense?

Cathy Larson and Roger Allen

Santa Monica

Answer: The short answer is no, according to a spokesman for Cox & Kings, whose global services division handles many (but not all) visas for the Indian government.

“There are ‘visa on arrival’ lanes at airports in 16 cities across India,� Warren Chang, chief operating officer for Cox & Kings, said in an email.

“To be eligible for a visa on arrival, U.S. passport holders must first apply online for an ‘e-tourist visa’ at least four days prior to arrival.�

If the applicant is approved, he or she receives an electronic authorization by email.

“The applicant must present a copy of the authorization to the airline in order to travel to India and present a copy to the immigration officer in India to obtain the visa upon arrival,� Chang wrote.

“Since your reader was unable to produce a copy of the authorization, it was within the rights of the airline to deny boarding.�

But couldn’t the airline bend the rules just a little?

Probably not.

“Airlines [that] carry passengers without proper paperwork into a country are subject to significant fines,� Chang wrote.

You can get an Indian visa in different ways: the e-visa, the method that led to the problem above; applying by mail; or using a visa service.

How difficult are these methods? When you go to the website of the Consulate General of India in San Francisco (there is not a consulate in L.A.), there is this red flag: It notes there’s an open house every two weeks to talk about problems with visas, passports and such.

To see how difficult the e-visa process is, I started through it. Start with the Indian Consulate website — www.cgisf.org — and you will be directed to the e-visa site.

It was a little confusing, and I got stuck at one point because I did not mark that I was a U.S. national by birth, which is a two-part question.

Chang had told me readers could call this number--011-91-11-2430-0666—so I did. The man who answered told me I needed a temporary number in order to receive help.

I hadn’t gotten that far in the process so I could not provide that and told him so.

He demanded to know where I got that phone number.

When I told him I got it from Cox & Kings, he said, in a not indifferent voice, “We are not able to help you. Call them.�

I managed to figure it out on my own. Because I’m not going to India, I did not complete the process, but I did just enough to know that the visa was going to cost me about $120.

Given the experience of Larson and Allen and the fact that there is no consulate in L.A., if I were going to India, I would go to a visa service to avoid such a situation.

I spoke with Ken Ripoll, owner of Los Angeles-based AllStar Sierra Passports & Visa, who said Indian visas could be a bit tricky. Because he’s a pro, his answer tells me that I would be better off letting someone else mind the details, which are not my strong suit, especially temperamentally. It’s good to have an ally and an advocate, especially when the world is increasingly cranky about rules.

As was the case with Larson and Allen, it’s often what you don’t know that can trip you up. It may cost you more to use a visa service, but in the end, having someone on your side to untangle things is like money in the bank.

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