Turkey/Iran border scam: nothing new
 

Hi,

Nothing really new but two of us bikers have had the same thing a day or so apart. A third is coming through in a week or two and I've warned him. We'll see how he gets on.

On the Iran side at Bazargan passport control is fine, it is the customs helpers who are the problem.

Firstly, they might well be quite efficient at getting the paperwork stamped and signed but then they operate two systems:

1. they take you down the hill from the main crossing to a semi-deserted building where they explain that you need to pay EUR50 for the terminal. I guessed they meant the Iranian Petrol rationing card. Whether you're legally meant to have one is moot you can quite easily get by without one. They will pester you and point at a dusty board saying cars and trucks pay much more but just say no.

2. they then take you (they have your paperwork so there's not much avoiding it unless you avoided them in the first place) to the insurance shop -- it's clearly sign-posted Iran Insurance on a sky blue sign on the left side near the exit. The poor lads in there looked intimidated and were unsure what to do but I was asked for EUR100 for 30days 3rd party insurance. I was shown no prices or paperwork and was at a bit of a loss so had to cough up. Matt refused and was taken outside the border to another Sigorta where after arguing left with only 2 weeks insurance for EUR40.

Learn your Persian numerals (it's very easy, 2&3 have fallen over and have a tail, 4&6 are upside down, 7&8 are a V and an inverted V, 1&9 are normal, 5 is an upside down heart and 0 is a .). They read L2R as in English.

The precise figures are written on the computer printed document (six tear-off sheets). In the top left sheet, fourth line down, right hand side is the price in Rials: 215,400 in my case (ie. about EUR18).

On the bottom two sheets are two dates three lines up written as yyyy/mm/dd and are listed L2R as to and from (in Persian they'd be reading the whole piece R2L so it would be from/to to them). The year is currently 1389 and in my case 30 days starting in September means that the dd part remains the same and only the mm changes by one.

They might show you a yellow sheet written by hand in English. This is simply rubbish. Mine has a child's attempt to overwrite 30days and 18EUR with 70days and 50EUR. I think they would have shown me this "proof" had I argued. It's made up rubbish and in my case laughably made up. The problem being they didn't show me any of this until I'd paid up.

The proof is on that orangey-pink computer printed sheet. Demand to see that and check the numbers.

My hotel man here in Tehran (at the Parasto Hotel) very kindly phoned up Bazargan (I only asked him to double check which numbers were which) and got hold of the main man who naturally said that I had paid these helpers for their service, his office had only received the IR215,400.

Anyway, nothing especially new but at least you can now check the document for the precise figures and tell them where to go!

It's a real shame as Iranians are the friendliest people and I can't fault them. Except their driving is crazy.

Cheers,

Ian

Thanks, Ian, I'll set this aside for my summer 2011's trip to Iran or Samarkand (via Iran).

:thumbup1:

Good post – great detail.
Border touts make a living by blatent lies mixed with a real understanding of the often mind-boggling border bureaucracy. Personally I try to brush them off, but in most countries where they can operate freely there is a kickback to the border officials, and they don’t like loosing their little bonus.
I went through Bazargan oktober ’08, and then it was the customs officials themselves who were asking for handouts, they asked for Euro 20 after doing nothing for over an hour, reckoning I must be an easy mark by then. The resulting explosion of rough language resulted in my papers being stamped and counterstamped at record speed, they wanted me out of there as fast as possible. Not a method I would recommend everywhere, but these guys fold easily. The booth at the bottom of the hill just countersigned the internal receipt, to make sure you had actually been processed, and not just weaselled your way through.
Insurance is probably a good idea, but the petrol card was a waste of time and money – nowhere did I have any problem with fuel, if they had any in the pumps I was pushed to the front of the queue. Overfilling, splashing several liters of high octane on a hot engine was definitely a more serious problem, as was the “inshallah” driving and “me-first” pushing-and-shoving in queues.
Security of you, your bike and luggage is taken very seriously, they say there is no crime in Iran, and then help you lift your bike into a hotel reception, up three steps. I was unfortunate enough to attract the attention of the counter-espionage agency, and was interviewed twice, as well as being followed, so I was probably safe from normal criminals. There is a bright side to everything.
If you are travelling east in the Baloch area you may have military escorts, they are usually a pain in the ass, but we will never know if they were really necessary. They are very trigger-happy, and sloppy weapons-handling is always dangerous. One soldier shot into the ground near my feet because I took too long drinking water whilst waiting for other tourists at a checkpoint, and another shot in the air to make Swiss-Marco turn his bus around. That was counter-productive, to say the least. Otherwise the average Iranian is very friendly, and helpful, though I do wonder if all the people I spoke to were actually who they said they were, and not informants for the Iranian Stasi.
In ’08 there seemed to be some sort of food rationing, even in mid-range restaurants most of the menu was “off”, but the kebab is available everywhere. Tap water is not safe to drink, and bottled water is available everywhere.
Safe travels
Peter, in Oslo

Hi Ian

Thanks for this information, very handy!
Cheers
Adastra

Thanks Ian ; this is exactly the kind of helpful detailed post which makes HU the place it is. Thanks also to GSPeter, for the detailed followup.

:thumbup1::thumbup1::thumbup1::scooter:

Thank you for that informative post Ian. We are hoping to cross from Turkey into Iran in a few weeks, currently underway in a rainy Germany :stormy:

My impression is you are better off without the helpers altogether? We have never done a proper big scary land border crossing before so it could be interesting...

Keep it between the hedges.

Neil

None of these shenanigans encountered at the Esendere/Serou crossing. Not a single tout in sight. I had green card insurance for Iran. The topic of insurance never came up however. Very friendly on both sides.

Thanks for the news Ian, I think the numerals you are trying to describe are Arabic even though they speak Farsi in Iran.

In which case this graphic is useful and as you say not so hard to memorise

http://www.sahara-overland.com/country/arabic-nums.jpg

Chris S

Hi,

Sat here with the hotel wireless I should do the decent thing and post some pictures! Sorry about the colouring: there's some disagreement between me, the camera, the PC software, the ....

Hopefully I've attached the official 3rd part insurance form then blow-ups of the two relevant parts (the price in Rials and the to&from dates) and the "yellow" hand-written form.

You can see from the numbers that, certainly here the glyphs used are not quite the same as Chris' examples. Most of the 4s I've seen are like the computer printed form though there are a few road signs (speed limits mostly) where they use the reversed "3" as a 4 -- I haven't seen a speed limit without an "English" translation. Most of the time it is much like an upside down (open) four. We do have two ways of writing a 4 in English (closed or open). The 6s here tend to have a rounded (and open) blob at the top. As to whether they're Arabic or Persian, see wikipedia which has a comprehensive looking page!

You can see the Persian 4 in the Rials price, 215400, and the 6 in the from date (the right hand one) 1389/06/23 and the to date is 1389/07/22 (hah! I'd misread that as 23 again!).

You can see on the "yellow" hand-written form that they've done a poor job of correcting from 30 days and EUR18(?) to 70days and EUR50.

As I said, I only received any of this after I'd coughed up EUR100.

Cheers,

Ian

dieselcard and bordercrossıng
 

Hey travellers,

thanks for the ınformatıon!

We are now before Bazargan and just heared the news about the dieselcard....
How does this work at the border, if you don't accept the "help" of the helpers. Do you still have to buy it? or can you avoid this ın some way? Maybe by tellıng them that you are drıvıng petrol? Or ıs the border south (Esendere/Serou ) a much better optıon concernıng all the hassle ın the Bazargan?

Thanks for the heads-up!

Insurance
 

One more question,

what types of ınsurance are you able to get at the border? Sınce the traffıc ıs crazy ın Iran, I'm thınkıng of gettıng all-rısk/full casco, ıs thıs possıble or only the one where the other party gets money when you hıt them (I don't know the Englısh term).

Thanks for the ınfo!

We yust cros 4 days ago the border at Esendere/Serou with no problem at all. We have carnet de passages.

Chers, Zoran and Tamara, curently in Qazvin

Thanks Zoran and Tamara,
Dıd you have to buy a dıeselcard or are you drıvıng petrol? How about the ınsurance? and lıcense plates?
Thanks agaın!

I suspect getting full risk 'comprehensive' insurance will be a bit of a dream in Iran or anywhere on the road - or it will be very expensive. Better to drive/ride carefully.

Chris S

Wow, lots of info. Thanks for the İmages Ian, they should defınıtely come ın handy ın a couple of weeks.

Ian you mentioned the problems ın Iran, and I keep hearıng of people shıppıng around, rather than goıng through. I´ve been somewhat out of the loop for the past month but from scannıng the net I can´t fınd any recent developments ın political relatıonshıps or otherwıse that would cause above usual concern ın thıs area? Just the usual bloody cold weather in Eastern Turkey ın the very near future and polıce escorts through Baluchıstan area of Iran\Pakıstan. Have I mıssed anythıng? Apart from hopefully the snow?

Cheers
Bryn

Hi Bryn,

No, nothing's changed. The burning of NATO fuel trucks hasn't had a mention here in PK, they just give you police escorts everywhere! I'll post a more thorough update in a separate thread but suffice it to say I've had six days of police escorts from BAM through to here in Karachi. It's not obvious that they're going to stop either...

Cheers,

Ian

We are using petrol, but my friend who was last year in Iran with his car, usually got the card from truck drivers.
We didn't nead special insurance or license plates, yust carnet du pasage.

Good luck, Zoran and Tamara

Hi,

Came through the border at Bargazan a couple of days ago and wanted to add my experience to this thread. We had read that the road from Van to Esendere was not great with multiple checkpoints etc. We had been over a lot of bad roads in Turkey and thought it would be easier. The road from Van was certainly well surfaced and apart from a few wild dogs and kids with stones was fine.

As per Ian's experience it was all fine apart from the Iranian customs side (the last bit). When we came over to the Iran side the first official showed us to the "Turist Information" office where a friendly and honest man helped us through the procedure to get our passports stamped into the country and jump the queue in the process. Its a shame we could not have spoken to him later...

After this bit we went through to the customs hall where we again showed our passports at a booth on the left and then went through the customs to get the bikes in. The main problem here is that the customs officials have no uniform or ID so it was hard to tell them apart from the fixers who were mixing in.

The process was to take carnet to a well dressed (non uniformed) official standing outside who wrote some stuff on the back of the bottom carnet slip (to say he'd checked the bikes matched up to the Carnet) and then back inside to the admin office. Here they stamped up the carnet and took the bottom part off. They gave us a white chit (A5) size also stamped which we took back into the customs hall and handed to the non-uniformed customs guy standing at the big desk nearest the exit. He signed this off and then back outside to the bikes where we gave it to the first guy to sign again. The (presumably) police guy on the other side of the road also wanted to see this bit of paper and asked where we were headed. The fixers mixing around in all this spoke some english and had pointed these people out to us although we had not asked for their help.

As we left one of them asked if we needed to get insurance to which I replied yes I'd get it further down (I should have lied and said we had it but didn't know what was about to happen). We stopped on the way out to gather ourselves and headed down the 2km road out of the customs area to the final gate. The "Iran insurance" building is beside this gate. The fixers who we had seen before were already there milling around a small portakabin outside and beckoning us over. We parked up and they started talking about "Terminal" and to go inside their portakabin first but I went to the insurance office.

Several of them followed me in and one showed me a calculator and told me it was 70eur per bike. Much arguing ensued over the course of around 2 hours. The most effective thing seemed to be when we threatened to leave and went over to the customs gate where they followed us in. Over the course of this the price went from 70 to 60 then changed into dollars and then somehow became the price for 2 bikes. We ended up paying 800,000 Rial or roughly 40USD for each bike which is still more than others but at least not 140eur.

During all this I repeatedly asked if various people worked there, if they were officials etc. Of course the answer was yes but when asked what their jobs where I was given some varying answers such as weighbridge, lorry driver or road tax. Only at the end when the boss man from the Insurance co came in did I get some straight(er) answers and yes they were basically fixers. I told them I didn't want their help, had not asked for it, would not pay them and asked them to leave when the one big thug out of them (who I presume was getting the commision from this one) pushed me. It was all very intimidating but when my wife went to get the police outside they basically shooed her away. I specifically told the insurance guy the money was for insurance only and not for the fixers and he told me it was "my problem". At one point this insurance boss guy wanted to write something in my passport about me needing to trust people and intimated that I was somehow dishonest for not believing him. (of course since he is not an official he had no business even asking for my passport)

We told the younger guy that we would pay the price printed on the insurance document itself and lickity split it was printed but had the roughy 40usd price on it. Although saying that it was tricky to tell from the quality of the dot matrix printout what some figures were. So perhaps they can change these figures so beware. I did however manage to get a receipt although not sure if there is anyone I could write to about it?

Their main tactics are -
- you won't get out the customs gate without the insurance (questionable)
- don't drive in Iran without insurance (had no intention to!) or police will get you/if you have accident there would be big problem
- the price of insurance is government set (despite asking repeatedly I was shown no price lists and the price changed)
- the indication is that the young guy in the insurance office does not speak english (necessitating a fixer), but we later found that he spoke some and seemed to understand what we were saying just fine

Basically the whole thing is tied up and it seems everyone is getting a cut. I am not sure about the border gate official guy (who was wearing uniform) who seemed to be less bothered and get the impression he would have let us through and perhaps checking insurance was not part of his job. All that was needed for him to open the gate was the A5 white chit we already had from customs.

If I were to go this crossing again then I would take the road to Esendere. Failing that I'd go straight to the final customs gate and give the A5 white papers to the guy in uniform and do my best to ignore everyone else. There looked to be an insurance office in Maku anyway (green sign on the left about 600m before you come into the centre). If the guy at the gate did indeed stop me from leaving I'd probably take a taxi into town and get the insurance elsewhere just to stop these other guys getting anything out of it even if it cost more. However, it would mean leaving the bike there (better if you are in a group)

Stay safe out there and please don't let it put you off visiting Iran. The people here have been the most friendly and welcoming you could possibly imagine and would be worth the higher entry price anyway.:cool4:

Neil

Hi crazymanneil,

It sounds like you met the same guys. Their scam is obviously working well for them.

I've had this chitty system somewhere else (Syria or Jordan, maybe) where the right people need to sign/stamp the chitty to demonstrate that you've been through the process and the final man needn't bother checking every little detail just whether the chitty has been singed/stamped enough times.

You can just present it to him but you need to know how many signatures/stamps are expected before you can waltz out.

There was a 'Sekora' (spelling?) office on the other side of the roundabout/square at the exit of the border. The official Iranian Insurance building was just inside. Matt was done for EUR40 for two weeks for an m/c there just after me.

It's a really unimpressive entry into Iran considering how much better the people are in Iran.

Cheers,

Ian

Esendre route in
 

Hey guys it's Bryn on Tom's account.

So we went though on the southern route and had no issues at all. The road there was fine and the only check point we were pulled over at they gave us drinks and we had a chat. When they found out Tom was bingo fuel they immediately gave him 10 litres free. Then came the grapes! Needless to say there was no worries on the road to the boarder although I wouldn't take that road at night.

So we rocked up at the boarder an a kid showed us where to go on the Turkish side. He didn't even want anything afterwards but I gave him a couple of sweets for helping us out. Then over to the Iran side. My happiness dropped a little when the first official wisked our passports away. Then the Carnet came out an we had similar problems in that the Carnet officials where uninformed and hanging around in the car park. However once we worked out what was going on and who to talk to (didn't even see any fixers around) it was all easy to get the Carnet filled in. Then our passports were returned to us with no worries. The white chatty was filled in by uninformed officials number one and two (ask for mr fatty, no joke!) and we drove to the exit gate, haggled with some money changers that where giving us a rubbish rate, so we just rode out. Insurance wasn't even mentioned and neither was a fuel card which you don't need.

I would agree with Chris in that insurance might not even be worth the paper it's printed on. Just drive carefully. We haven't been stopped by any police so I couldn't say if they would take any issue with not having insurance, just smile wave an they wave back!

Updates and tip - October 2013
 

Bazargan was definitely the worst border that we crossed.

Be prepared to all sorts of scams.

The Turkish side was great, everything very organized, friendly and helpful blokes. After having your stamps done and your bike x-ray scanned, they open the gates to let you go. Easy and simple.

The Iranian gate is face to face with the turkish one, so, once the turkish one closes, the iranian opens. Good! Now we were in. An overweight fella smart dressed came to us and politely asked us "passports and carnets please!", okay, passports and carnets handled to him. 30 minutes later, he came back asking to move the bikes a side and come inside the building with him. Than, we realized that HE WASN'T a staff member, he was a fixer, a guy who nail you first, by the first gate, he gets your papers, sort out your stamps to make you pay for some insurance later and make his money!

Well, we are not stupids, when we realized that he wasn't a staff of the border, we had a big argument with him, we toke ours docs back and started sorting out our stamps ourselves. (funny that, the border is such a mess that nobody uses a badge or an uniform to distinguish the staff from the crowd, you know who is staff because the person is behind a desk). You will need about three stamps and the carnet done, which can be done my yourself quite quickly (depends how busy the border is). After having the passport and carnet stamped, the border agent asked if we had insurance for the bikes... we said we have a green card that we bought in Turkey, he replied that it doesn't work in Iran, that we have to buy a new one, at this moment the fat fella came again like a vulture after a new piece of carrion, he joined the border guy and both started talking about the insurance, that we should come outside, get the bikes and follow them in a car to the bottom of the hill where a little building with IRAN INSURANCE written in the entrance was placed. I went to the building and a man behind a desk and computer asked me to have a sit, done. I asked to him how much was the insurance and he replied asking me to ask the two fellas that brought us there, at this moment I realized that something was wrong, if the man behind the desk, which works with insurance could not tell straight away how much the insurance was, is because there was something wrong about it. so, I asked the border guy how much was it.... 100 euros each for year, I replied saying that we just needed for 10 days! "Well, doesn't matter, you have to buy for a year" he said. After much discussion and a pile of stressful moments, we refused to pay this stupid money, so, he finally said, "you can go without insurance than, pay me 30 euros and you can go", I didn't have any small notes in euros, but I had 20 pounds note, so, that worked, and he let us go. The fat fella wasn't happy, of course, the scam didn't work with us and he lost money, bastard. So, finally we were free to ride Iran!

In our case, nobody asked us to buy any petrol card at all, and I don't think worth it, unless you gonna spend months in Iran. The petrol is very cheap even without the card, 7000 rials per liter, or 4000 rials with the card.

Just a note: at the bottom of the hill at the border you will find hundreds of people trying to exchange money and convince you to buy insurance... Be smart, make sure to check on line in Turkey what is the exchange rates for the currencies you have to Iranian rials, otherwise you will be lost to negotiate price with this guys. When in Turkey, we could not find any place to exchange money for Iranian rials, the only place we found was at the border and inside Iran.

Petrol in Iran is okay, I read here before my trip that the petrol is cheap but the quality is bad. Bullshit, the petrol is more than fine, actually, my bike got even more economic with Iranian petrol, I did't notice any substantial loss in performance, anyway, I wasn't in a track day, I was riding a adventure bike in a public road. If you eventually take your super bike to Iran, just ask for petrol super at the petrol station, it has more octane, but it is not available everywhere.

When you get to the border, do not handle your docs for anyone polite just because he is dressed smartly, he is just a fixer. Park your bike a side and get inside the building to make sure about who is in charge.

Iran has one of the most friendly people you can find, but the borders and the police are disgraceful.

Make sure you have some money exchanged at the border, enough to have petrol, food and accommodation paid until you reach a big city. Yes, you can pay hotels with dollars, but the exchange rate is not gonna be that great.

Don't expect people speaking english so easy (unless you are in a big city), was hard to make them understand the language of the signals!!!!!

BIG tips:
- because the Iranian money has so many zeros, they informally cut one zero from the money, so, 40.000 rials is equal 4.000 tomans. Get familiar with this! so, if they ask for 10.000 tomans, means 100.000 rials!
- get a mask, actually, get a mask and some spare ones to use all the times, Iran is very very polluted, if you are western, you will face a level of pollution that you never saw in your life, some times, the atmosphere gets so polluted that you barely see the end of the road.

If you need more info, let me know!

Good luck!

Hello and thanks for posting your experience, joasphoto!

So, at the end you rode Iran without any insurace coverage, is that correct?
Well, this would worry me a little bit... :frown:

Didn't you spot any other official offices after leaving the border station (on the road, I mean...) where you could work it out without fixers or those tricky helpers?

Slight D-tour BUT instead of Dogubeyazit we thought we'd go see Georgia and Armenia and cross in from Norduz (Armenia) the border took 2-3hours but was a doddle. No fixers, no chasers. Staff took us from desk to desk. It wasn't too busy either. Well it was busy with lorry drivers but they have a tonne of paperwork to sort out, so the carnet didn't take too long. Although here as-well no one had uniforms. We crossed in September 2013, arrived around 1pm and left just before 4pm and bombed it to Tabriz.

Insurance booth was closed, no one said we had to buy it either. Spent 28days in Iran.. no one asked for insurance even once. Police just liked looking at the bike and smiling.

Hi! Has any of you crossed into Iran recently with a US registered bike?

I heard that I might have a problem, even with a Turkish passport, and the consulate in Istanbul wasn't exactly helpful when they said "sure, you MAY have a problem with US tags".

Thanks!

When me and my son crossed the border Turkey/Iran at Bazargan we had no trouble at all,fixers are everywhere and they give you fast service, use them if you want but dont pay their price, they wanted 40 euros per person but we gave 10 per person.
About insurance, i simply refused it, i told them that i got all insurance i need and they accepted that, i never even got of the bike just shouted the info to them.
About fuelcard, i was never given the oportunity to buy it and we didnt need it either.

cheers