If you are going to visit Russia just once in a certain period of time for a purpose of tourism or business and you are not planning to stay there for longer than 30 days, your best choice is tourist visa. Tourist visa to Russia can be issued even on the same day you apply for it. But if you have enough time you might consider the longest and the cheapest processing of 10 business days. Other options include 5 business days and next business day. If you’d like to stay in Russia for longer than 30 days you will have to apply for a different type of visa (see below).

If you’d like to go to Russia for less than 30 days but you have plans on leaving Russia and than on coming back there within this span, you will need a double entry tourist visa.

For example, if you want to:

- arrive in Moscow on September 15th.
- leave to Morocco on September 19th.
- arrive back to Moscow on September 30.
- fly back to US on October 1 -

you will have to apply for a double entry tourist visa.

According to the new regulation (effective starting March 2008) to be qualified for double entry tourist visa you have to provide the itinerary for you planned second trip from and back to Russia (in an example case above – you tickets from Moscow to Morocco and back). If you do not have paper tickets, a copy of your reservation or e-tickets would be enough. Without such a proof a double entry tourist visa can not be issued. Note that the processing fee for double entry visa is bigger than the one for single entry visa.

In case you need to stay in Russia for longer than 30 days you have several options depending of the purpose of your visit:

1.Private (homestay) visa.

If you are to pay a private visit to your friends and relatives you will have to ask a person whom you are planning to stay at in Russia at to take care of your invitation. Usually it takes somewhat between one and three months to obtain a private invitation from Russian authorities. Once you get it you can apply for Russian private visa which allows you to stay in the country for up to 90 days. Note that you have to provide an original invitation for the processing; Russian Consulates do not accept copies. Although Russiagateway.com can not assist you with obtaining a private invitation, we still will be glad to help you in processing your private visa.

2.Business visa.

One of the best and the easiest way to go to Russia for longer than 30 days is to obtain Russian business visa. Business visa to Russia can be issued for 1 month, 3 months, 6 months and 12 months and can be single-entry, double-entry or multiple-entry. Russiagateway.com can assist you with business invitation to Russia. Please note that we need additional 4-6 business days to obtain an invitation for 1 month and 3 months. As for invitations for 6 month and 12 months we need 14-16 additional business days.

What documents I have to send by mail?

In order to obtain a Russian tourist visa you have to send us the following:

1. Actual passport with at least two blank visa-designated pages. Passport must be valid for at least 6 months after intended departure from Russia;

2. One passport-size photograph;

3. Russian visa application form - 2 pages (for US citizens), 1 page (for non US citizens) completed and signed;

4. Payment for visa service: A company or personal check or money order made payable to "EastBlaze Connection Inc". The payment depends of the time of visa processing you choose.

Please, note that we charge an additional fee of $23 dollars for Standard Overnight FedEx mailing service to send your documents back to you when they are ready. Of course, you have an option of sending prepaid label or envelope for any of mailing services you prefer. If you have your own FedEx account to be used for shipment you will just need to provide the number of this account.

Our mailing address is:
Russiagateway.com
1173 A Second Ave, PNB 147
New York, NY 10065

If you have any questions please contact us by e-mail: visa@russiagateway.com or call us at: 212-480-2233