hello all ,just been on to russian consulate in london,spoke about arranging visa,s.when enetring ruissia will be on buisness visa,ho does anybody have any idea how long the bike will be registerd for the consulate have no idea.i believe its only for 3o days then you have to extend it it in st,petersburg anybody have any experience of this with thanks paul.

Visas and immigration are totally separate from the issue of a temporary import certificate for your bike which is a customs issue!
For general guidelines try www.waytorussia.net talklounge (forum).
From my understanding of the process, one car trip to Russia from the UK, the time period depends on 2 things...

1 Which border crossing (posts on WTR website)
2 Type of visa (inferred from advice on WTR website and my experience)

My experience extends only to "private" invititation visas - for this - at Finland, Nuijamaa/Russia, Brusnichoye you get 10 working days.:-(
The above website, transport section, implies you ought to get up to 30 days on a tourist visa.
The trouble is, none of the bike people on HUBB understand enough of this in order to provide meaningful information - though they manage to travel across Russia, year after year.
I for one would be interested to know what the official periods are.
Hopefully , I've clarified the problem, even if I don't have the exact answer.
Note - I described my experience of extending the t.i.c. - on HUBB and on WTR - my russian trip write up.
Good Luck
Les

I crossed into Russia from the Ukraine; I had a 90 day double entry business visa. I got my Russian motorcycle insurance on the Ukraine side of the boarder for 2 months. The Russian officials gave me a permit for the bike which matched the finished date of the insurance, so I had a motorcycle permit and insurance for 2 months. My guess is if you arrive with a 90 day visa and 90 days insurance you should get a 90 day permit.
It is easy to buy insurance once in Russia but I doubt extending the bike permit would be as easy.
Whatever you do don't try and wing it without the correct documents, there are lots of checks and it will be only a matter of time before getting caught.
Behind the road side police check points you will see a compound full of confiscated cars and bikes.

ok thanks for your replies paul.

Apart from riding across Russia, I still have to travel to Russia a lot for business reasons ...

I can tell you that you are far better getting a one year multi entry (business) visa that anything else. The multi entry visas are infinately flexible with respect to timing of entries and exits whereas the single and double entry visas will cramp you for time. Also crossing to and from Mongolia Kazakhstan Ukraine etc are so much easier with the multi entry visas. Yeah they cost a little more but its the only way to go if you need freedom and flexibility.

Go to www.visalink.ru to get the invite. They are quick and as cheap as you are going to get.

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colebatch thanks for that,did you get visa,s from them personally for a trip.they are not expensive
rung visa agents they want
£150. for a letter of invatation.

Visalink issue you with the invitations. Actually getting the visa is something you have to do yourself and the details of that are here:

http://www.rusemblon.org/ (click business visa button on left column)

Basically, once you get the invite, you need to fill in a visa application form, attach visa payment (£100 for a multi entry business visa), foto, and a nice neat letter saying who you are (and make something up about looking for investment opportunities in Russia) and away you go. I tend to find it easier to get the visa by post from the Edinburgh consulate (Its much quicker as its less busy). Applying in person at the Russian consulate in London will tie up loads of your time ... its queue city. If you go the edinburgh consulate route (and I advise you to unless you are desperately short of time) you will need to send it in a Special Delivery envelope and enclose a Special Delivery envelope for them to send it back to you. You can also send postal orders to the consulate for payment, but if you front up in person, then you must pay cash.

Contact details for the Edinburgh consulate are:

Consulate General of the Russian Federation
58 Melville Street
Edinburgh
EH3 7HF

Tel: 0131 225 7098

- - -

Yes mate, I get 12 month multi entry visas this way every year.

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I just back from my russia trip (but unfortunately I did not arrived to Vladivostok becouse I fall down and broke my shoulder) I had a 90 days visa and 90 days insuranse but I get permit only for 20 days. We spent one all day in Novosibirsk to extend the bike permit (with help of one russian biker)