Vietnam E-Visa: Apply on the Official Website or Use an Agency?

Every Vietnam e-visa is issued by the same office: the Immigration Department of Vietnam's Ministry of Public Security. You can send your application to it yourself, or pay an agency to send it for you. The visa you receive is identical either way - the same 90 days, the same entry rules, the same PDF.

So the question is not which visa is better. It is whether the work and the risk are worth paying someone else to carry. For plenty of travellers they are not, and we say so below.

The short answer

• Apply yourself if you have two weeks or more before you fly, your passport is straightforward, and you are happy to follow strict photo rules and check the status yourself.
• Use an agency if you fly soon, your name or passport is unusual, you have had an application refused before, or you are applying for several people and want one person responsible for getting every file right.

Side by side

	Official website	Agency
Who issues the visa	Vietnam Immigration Department	Vietnam Immigration Department
What you pay	The government fee only: US$25 single entry, US$50 multiple entry	The government fee plus the agency's service fee
Who fills in the form	You	You give the details; the agency enters them
Photo and passport scan checked before lodging	No - problems surface afterwards	Yes, by a person, at a good agency
If immigration wants something changed	Shown on the status page; no email is sent	The agency sees it, tells you and fixes it
Faster handling	No paid fast-track	Express or urgent options at many agencies
If the visa is refused	The government fee is not refunded	Depends on the agency's terms
Someone to ask	A support email address	WhatsApp, email or phone

What applying yourself involves

The official addresses are evisa.gov.vn and thithucdientu.gov.vn. Both lead to the same portal. Anything else is a private site, however official it looks - see how to spot a fake e-visa website.

You will need:

• a passport valid for at least six months after the day you arrive
• a portrait photo on a white background and a scan of the passport's photo page
• your arrival date, your entry port and your first address in Vietnam
• a card to pay the government fee

The form is in English and takes 15 to 30 minutes with everything to hand. After paying, keep the confirmation email: it holds your application number, and without that number you cannot look the application up. Then check the status yourself every working day or two, because the portal does not email you when it wants something changed. How to check your e-visa status.

Where self-applications go wrong

Most refusals and delays come from a handful of details:

• The photo. A background that is not white, glasses, shadows, a cropped selfie or a photo of a photo. The photo rules.
• The names. They must match the passport's code lines in full and in the right order. A missing middle name is enough for an airline to refuse boarding.
• The dates. The e-visa is valid from the date you give. Land a day earlier and it is not yet valid.
• Silence mistaken for approval. An application waiting for a correction looks just like one still being processed.

None of these is hard. They are easy to miss when you are doing it for the first time. Nine mistakes to check for.

What an agency should do for its fee

An agency cannot make immigration approve a visa it would otherwise refuse, and should never claim it can. What a good one does:

1. A person checks the photo, the scan and every field against the passport before anything is lodged.
2. It lodges the application, pays the government fee and watches the status every working day.
3. If immigration asks for a change, it makes it - without charging you again.
4. It offers faster handling when your flight is close. How urgent processing works.
5. It refunds you if the visa is refused or late, and says so in writing.

That is what our fee covers. The prices for the single-entry e-visa and the multiple-entry e-visa include the government fee, and our terms set out the refund. If you would rather do it yourself, the step-by-step guide works for the official website too.

How to check an agency before you pay

Five checks, two minutes:

• It names the company behind it, with a registration number you can look up. Ours is SS Visa and Travel Group Pty Ltd, ABN 65 679 999 243, which you can find on Australia's ABN Lookup.
• It says plainly that it is not the government.
• It shows the full price up front, government fee included, before you type in your passport details.
• It has a written refund policy.
• A person answers when you send a question.

Frequently asked questions

Is evisa.gov.vn the official Vietnam e-visa website?

Yes. evisa.gov.vn and thithucdientu.gov.vn are the Vietnam Immigration Department's own addresses for the e-visa portal.

Is it safe to get a Vietnam visa through an agency?

Yes, with a registered agency that tells you who it is, what you pay and what happens if the visa is refused. The visa is issued by the same government office either way.

Do agencies get a different kind of visa?

No. An e-visa lodged by an agency is the same e-visa, valid for the same stay and accepted at the same entry points.

Is it cheaper to apply on the official website?

Yes. Applying direct costs only the government fee: US$25 for single entry or US$50 for multiple entry. The saving disappears if a mistake means paying the government fee a second time.

Can an agency guarantee my visa will be approved?

No. The decision belongs to the Immigration Department alone. An agency that promises approval is promising something it does not control.

I started on the official website. Can an agency take it over?

Not an application someone else has lodged. If yours has stalled and your flight is close, the practical step is a new application with urgent processing.