Necessary documents for not going to Vietnam
October 1, 2014 10:41 AM   Subscribe

I have a multi-stop plane ticket that takes me (a US citizen) to Ho Chi Minh city by way of several other places. I am not planning to go all the way to Vietnam - I'm planning to throw away the rest of the ticket upon arrival in Rome. It's my understanding I *would* need a visa (or written approval for a visa upon arrival) if I were to go to Vietnam. Will airport check-in agents on the earlier flights want to see that I have a visa or VOA letter for Vietnam?

The flight to HCMC is several days after I arrive in Rome (my actual final destination). I have already booked return travel on a different ticket.

The airline in question is Alitalia. The originating airport is JFK.

Anything else I should consider? When is the best time to cancel the rest of the ticket? I was planning on arriving in Rome and then cancelling the rest of the ticket, but if there's a good practical reason to cancel earlier, I'm open to it.

Is it worth it to just spend a few bucks on a VOA letter just in case?
posted by mskyle to Travel & Transportation (17 answers total)
 
I believe they will not let you board, as they have no guarantee that you will not continue the journey, thereby sticking them with a problem. In fact, if you disclose to them that you plan to abandon your journey, they may cancel the entire ticket - as that likely violates their terms of carriage with you.

Why are you abandoning the subsequent legs? Certainly a ticket to Viet Nam via Rome can't be cheaper to a ticket to Rome alone.
posted by scolbath at 10:56 AM on October 1, 2014 [3 favorites]


I was planning on arriving in Rome and then cancelling the rest of the ticket, but if there's a good practical reason to cancel earlier, I'm open to it.

The good practical reason is that it removes all the anxiety about what documentation they will and won't accept at the airport (and the possibility that customs/immigration at Rome will get antsy about the fact that you're ditching from your stated destination and subject you to extra scrutiny). The question, though, is whether you can simply "cancel" that portion while leaving the rest intact without incurring penalties.
posted by yoink at 11:09 AM on October 1, 2014 [1 favorite]


Yeah, what scolbath said. Airlines won't let you take only one leg of a flight, unfortunately. In one instance, I needed to go from London to the East Coast, and, bizarrely, the flight from Edinburgh - London - East Coast was cheaper than the exact same London - East Coast leg without the Edinburgh leg tacked on the beginning. I was in the south of England, and obviously wanted to avoid traveling all the way up to Edinburgh just to fly back down to London again, so I wanted to cancel the Edinburgh leg and keep the rest of the flight. I called the airline, and they confirmed that I needed to take both legs of the Edinburgh flight or they would cancel my ticket, and it might cause future problems with travel with them (and maybe with the authorities? - unsure.). If you have a return flight, it will be cancelled if you fail to take all legs of your outbound flight. You might be able to get away with only taking the leg to Rome if you don't tell them in advance, if you don't have a return with the same airline that they can cancel, and if you're not checking any baggage; but I wouldn't count on it, and it might raise problems for future travel.
posted by ClaireBear at 11:10 AM on October 1, 2014


People seem to be missing that the Rome - Vietnam segment is several days after the first leg.
posted by jaguar at 11:17 AM on October 1, 2014 [1 favorite]


People seem to be missing that the Rome - Vietnam segment is several days after the first leg.

Oh, yeah--I did miss that. If that's the case, it's clearly a separate flight and no one at the departing airport will care. They'll see you're on a flight "to Rome" and care only that you have the necessary papers to enter Italy. What you do once you've been admitted to Italy isn't their concern. So, no, there's no reason to worry. I'd still cancel the Italy-Vietnam ticket immediately rather than waiting until I'm in Rome, but there's no need to get a Vietnam visa.
posted by yoink at 11:28 AM on October 1, 2014


Response by poster: Sorry, clarifications: it is a ONE WAY multi-stop ticket to HCMC. I am returning from Rome on a completely different ticket on a different airline. I understand that I can't skip one leg of a ticket and then resume travel on the same ticket.

Also I just looked again, and the flight to Vietnam is actually on Air France. And it's a week later. Basically my question is, will anyone at JFK care?

I'm concerned about canceling the Italy-Vietnam ticket now in case they give me trouble about canceling part of the journey but not the whole ticket - once I'm in Rome, there's really nothing the airline can do that will cause me any trouble, whereas before I get on the flight to Rome they *can* mess things up for me.

(And yes, the ticket was very very cheap, and I'd like to go to Vietnam sometime, but I don't have time right now and it's much less expensive to get back to the US East Coast from Europe than it is from Asia.)
posted by mskyle at 11:43 AM on October 1, 2014


It sounds like the stopover may make it work, but you might consider passing it by Flyertalk on the subform of the airline of your initial segment.
posted by scolbath at 11:46 AM on October 1, 2014 [1 favorite]


If you bought the whole thing as one ticket, even if the flight to Vietnam is a week later in a different airline I still don't think you can officially cancel that leg (although it would likely make it more feasible just not to show up for that leg). But if the whole NYC-France-Vietnam trip is on one ticket (with the week in France as a layover), I still thing it holds that you can't officially cancel it without your whole outbound ticket getting cancelled. If you bought them as two separate flights than I think you could cancel the leg to Vietnam without a problem, however.
posted by ClaireBear at 11:49 AM on October 1, 2014


Response by poster: OK how about this question: What will the Alitalia people at JFK want to see in terms of documentation from me, if I am traveling on what appears to them to be a one-way ticket to Vietnam?

Let's forget all about canceling flights.
posted by mskyle at 11:53 AM on October 1, 2014


So let's get this straight. Do you have in your possession a ticket that says JFK-Roma-HCMC, or do you have two separate bookings that say JFK-Roma and Roma-HCMC? (I am neglecting the return trip, because you say that is a totally separate booking. Although airlines aren't going to look very favorably on passengers who commit the kind of hijinks that you're planning to, and could block you from further travel with them, as others have said.)

In the first case, the airline will require you to have the appropriate entry visa for Vietnam before you board the plane in New York. They will not let you board without this, as it is in their best interest not to have to schlep a passenger who was refused entry into their intended destination.

On your update, I think your plan just might work, since the carriers are different, and presumably the airline understands that you're going to be bumming around Rome for a week with your baggage and not hang out in the airport. You could also just get a visa to Vietnam. But you have another problem, which is your legality of stay in Italy. How long are you staying there? If it's less than 90 days, you're fine (if you're American, which I'm assuming). If it's more than 90 days, or if you're doing non-tourist-type activities, you will need proof of entry permission for Italy.
posted by Liesl at 11:55 AM on October 1, 2014


If you bought the whole thing as one ticket

Unless it's a code-share deal, I can't quite see how a flight from NYC-Rome on Alitalia can be on the "same ticket" as a flight a week later from Rome to HCMC on Air France.

Still, this sounds like something that could be definitively answered by a quick call to Alitalia.

In the first case, the airline will require you to have the appropriate entry visa for Vietnam before you board the plane in New York


If the flight to HCMC leaves Italy a week after the flight from NYC arrives, I'm not sure this is true. They will know that he has to clear customs/immigration in Rome regardless. They will also know that he'll be checked at Rome airport for his Vietnam documentation before he gets on that plane. I think the only thing they'll care about when he's departing NYC is A) does he have the necessary documentation to clear customs/immigration in Rome and B) can he prove that he has return airfare.
posted by yoink at 12:01 PM on October 1, 2014


Best answer: I think your plan will work. I base this on two things.

1) I went to Vietnam without a visa in 2005. I just forgot to get it. The airline didn't bother me. When I arrived in Vietnam I had to get a visa right there and they weren't happy about it but it all worked out somehow. It might have been a fluke. I don't know.

2) You'll be in Rome several days. For all the airline knows, you have your Vietnam visa waiting for you in Rome. The guys in JFK want to ensure that you will be allowed into Italy. Its the guys in Rome that have to worry about getting you to Vietnam.

You could always call Alitalia and say "Hey, is it ok if I travel to Rome without my Vietnam visa? I plan to take care of everything in Rome." That is a way of asking without revealing your true intentions.
posted by vacapinta at 12:03 PM on October 1, 2014 [7 favorites]


Best answer: This should work, but there are absolute no guarantees. The airline at JFK might ask you about the visa issue, but your answer should be that you are picking up the visa at the Vietnamese embassy in Rome (or some other nearby city).

Don't contact either airline in advance about canceling the Rome - HCM leg before getting to Rome. Personally I wouldn't contact them even after arriving to Rome, but would just be a no-show.

What you are planning to do is called hidden city ticketing. This is against airline's conditions of carriage and you agreed to those when you purchased the ticket. If you advise them of your plan they could technically ask you to pony up ticket price to Rome, which is likely higher than to Vietnam.

However, hidden city ticketing can work very well. For instance last minute tickets from Boston to London are usually really expensive. However flying to Dublin through London is priced totally different. So flying with hand luggage only or switching from Heathrow to Gatwick will work [if you don't do it too often].
posted by zeikka at 12:42 PM on October 1, 2014


Response by poster: Thanks all - I think I may try just calling Alitalia and asking what documents they need me to have when I check in at JFK, which is surely something that anyone might want to know. Hopefully they don't expect me to have evidence of onward travel from Vietnam!

I know I'm being a bit sneaky but for what it's worth when I bought the ticket I was at least *hoping* to go to Vietnam. It just isn't going to work out time-wise. The way I look at it, people have to cut trips short in the middle for work or family reasons all the time - I just know about it a little further in advance.
posted by mskyle at 1:14 PM on October 1, 2014 [1 favorite]


One thing-- don't put any FF#s on your ticket.
posted by sandmanwv at 1:54 PM on October 1, 2014 [3 favorites]


I went via Vietnam to Europe from Australia recently and people without visas were refused boarding in Australia. (See my question about this in my posting history, because it was totally not straight forward and many mefites assured me I wouldn't need a visa).
That said, since you can get a Vietnamese visa online within a couple of days, and you have a week in Rome when you could theoretically do that, and the airline would have another opportunity to refuse you boarding (in Rome) I suspect you'll be okay.

If you end up having to argue it at JFK I would tell them you plan to get your visa while in Rome, or even that you got it already and a friend has the letter waiting for you in Rome to pick up. (The Vietnamese visa is just a letter that you hand in at the airport in exchange for the stamp on your passport. So the JFK people would not expect to see anything on your passport at this stage anyway.)
posted by lollusc at 4:29 PM on October 1, 2014


Response by poster: Update: we didn't run into any problems. Alitalia agents at JFK didn't seem to have any knowledge of or interest in the HCM flight at all.
posted by mskyle at 6:46 AM on December 2, 2014 [3 favorites]


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