I am married to a Vietnamese women. When I still lived with her abroad, I had a VEC. four years ago we moved to Vietnam. My wife sells clothes in our own house and I help her but the business is on her name.
When I came for an extension at the immigration police 4 years ago, they told me that they could not extent the VEC, instead they gave me VR visa. The VR visa could not extent either, so every half year I get a new VR sticker in my passport.
Last month I needed a new visa and ask them if I could get a TT visas, but according to them, although I’m married to a Vietnamese citizen I can’t get one because I have no work, I’m retired.
Is it true that I can only get a VR-visa instead of a TT visas and later a TCR?
I was on a single entry VR, which I renewed once with expiry date 23/10/2015. I took a 5 day trip to Australia a few weeks before expiry and got a 1 month DL Visa On Arrival to return to Vietnam as I had no time to get another VR. I wanted to get a TT visa when the VR expired but was told I couldn,t because I had obtained the DL which disqualified me, and that I would need to leave the country when it expired. I then went to Phnom Penh with some of the necessary paperwork, handed it in at the Vietnam Embassy on a Saturday morning, paid an extra $10 to fast track and got it back in 1 hour.Because I was in Phnom Penh,the Ho Chi Minh office( see the address below) faxed the other paperwork through to the Vietnam Embassy for me because I couldn,t get back into Vietnam to collect it. The cost for the 6 month TT including the extra $10 was $124. In my application form I put down "retired" as I have always done when asked my occupation, so I don,t understand why you were refused the TT. I live in Dalat and my paperwork was done at the main immigration office at 254 Nguyen Trai Ho Chi Minh City, and it had to be submitted by my wife, not me. I think the best thing is for you and your wife to take a trip to Ho Chi Minh and ask all the questions about your position and obtain all the forms you need, as this is the place that you must deal with anyway if you are in South Vietnam. Yours just being a straight forward case, you will just need to return to Ho Chi Minh a week or so after making application to get your TT.It,s time consuming, but worth it I can,t speak about what you may need to do if you are in the North. About 2 weeks before my TT expires I will apply for a TRC and don,t expect any problems
