PRC - Spouse free advice (Permanent Residance Card)

We hare recently married and I believe now eligable for a Permanent Residence Card which would allow me to come and go without having to get a visa for a period of 3 years.. I am currently in Vietnam on a 90 day tourist visa.

I believe you may be confusing a TRC (temporary residence card) with that of a PRC (permanent residency card).

You would not qualify for a PRC under your current situation. See the gov't of VN website

"PROCEDURES FOR PERMANENT RESIDENCE CARDS..." (Link)

Scroll down to "Conditions for consideration for permission for permanent residence:", specifically, #3. "Foreigners guaranteed by their parents, spouses or children, who are Vietnamese citizens permanently residing in Vietnam, must have been temporarily residing in Vietnam for at least 3 consecutive years." Time spent in VN under a tourist visa does not count towards the "3 consecutive years" residency requirement.

You can read more on a thread from last year titled, "PRC not TRC", here.

From what I can find out from visiting the Immagration office in Ha Noi we really only need to take a couple of forms our certificate of marrige and all our identification documents and $150US to the relevant immigration office in my spouses region to put in the application which can take between 5 to 10 days. Does anybody have experience or advise on applying for this card? - @duggin

That sounds suspiciously like the procedure for getting a VEC/TRC.

See the gov't of VN website, "PROCEDURES FOR TEMPORARY RESIDENCE CARDS..." (Link)

Though our Search  function can be rather iffy, take a look through these results for further member reports/information on VECs and TRCs.