Garuda to Issue Visas in the Air

Tempo Interactive, Tuesday, 26 January, 2010 | 16:46 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Tokyo: National flag-carrier airline Garuda Indonesia start will to offer visas on arrival (VoA) on flights on February 1st.

The program entitled “Immigration on Board" was tested on the GA881 flight from Tokyo to Denpasar on January 21.

“This is the world first visa service in the air,” said Emirsyah Satar, Managing Director of Garuda Indonesia.

Present on the flight were the caretaker Immigration Director General Muhammad Indra and the Indonesian Ambassador for Japan Jusuf Anwar.

The second trial will be held today.

With this service, tourists or those who wish to travel to Indonesia do not have to process their visas before their departure or upon arriving at the Denpasar or Jakarta airports.

To process this, passengers can buy a visa voucher after they check in at Narita Airport, Tokyo.

“A visa for 10 days visit costs US$ 10 and a visa for 30-60 days visit cost US$ 25," said Muhammad Indra.

Jusuf said he hoped that the new service would increase the number of Japanese tourists which has been in decline for the last two years.

To increase the number of visits from Japan to Indonesia, according to Emirsyah, Garuda is attempting to have direct flights from Tokyo to Jakarta.

All this time, Japanese passengers have had to go to Denpasar first.

“We hope that this year, direct flights from Tokyo to Jakarta can be operated,’ he said.

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