Chinese Visa with no return ticket

If you have the visa, yes, they'll let you fly.

I know it's possible to get a chinese visa without plane tickets with an agency, otherwise no idea. Please keep us updated, I'm genuinely interested.

>>1267842
Yeah of course they give you visas if you have no flights. I walked right over the border from Hong Kong, and walked right back over.

if you have the visa you are sorted, that's all they need to see.
if you get rejected consider getting a refundable ticket, use that info to get your visa at which point you cancel the ticket and then yeah you're good to go. flew from tokyo to beijing on my own as a tourist.
i went through an agency and it wasnt terribly cheap but they sorted that shit easy for me.

>>1267842
Chinese visas are a fickle buisiness, application can vary considerably depending on which office handles your application; and where you enter

the airline will fly you, that isn't the issue.
your problem might be the office you filed with might be reluctant to forward your visa application to the chinese.

some countries you need to file with a domestic office, who handball it to their mainland chinese counterparts for the rubber stamp.
Sometimes they are reluctant to pass on an application that doesn't have a return ticket.

I was told explicitly "you must have a return flight booked".
I was even cautioned about having an entry flight to HK but not a connection to mainland as I entered by rail

quote travelchinaguide "5. Documents showing the itinerary including round trip air ticket booking record and proof of hotel reservation, etc
quote wikivoyage "Consulates and travel agents have been known to occasionally request proof of onward travel at the time of visa application."

bottom line is it's not uniform, it varies by where you apply and the political climate.
someone from india might have considerably more trouble for instance.
how likely is that? I couldn't say

>>1267847
now this could be seriously misleading
most people can arrive in HK with no visa at all, so nobody receives any real scrutiny on arrival.

> I walked right over the border from Hong Kong, and walked right back over.
do you mean you connected to mainland by rail, car or that you literally walked?
I'm pretty sure you can't VOA china, even from HK with the exeption of the "schengzhen only visa"
if you actually got that visa it's totally different

so what you mean I think is "I got a visa successfully, then crossed without issue"

that's important, because if OP has an issue it will be GETTING the visa, not the actual crossing

>>1267886
and quote the US-chinese immigration website
http://www.china-embassy.org/eng/visas/hrsq/#L

6. Documents showing the itinerary including air ticket booking record (round trip) and proof of a hotel reservatio

>>1267842
I hitchhiked there. I was never asked about any means I have to enter China and any means I need to exit. I think I told them which road I'm going to take (I was going from Mongolia to Kyrgyzstan - both were visa-free for me) but I can't remember, really.
They never cared

>>1267887
>>1267886
>>1267881
>>1267847
>>1267844

Thanks for info guys, it's much appreciated. I guess all that's left is to wait and see, I should know in a week. I will update then to let you know what happened.
I did include hotel reservations in my application, among them the reservations in Hong Kong and Macau where I'm heading after visiting the mainland China (but without mentioning how I'm going to get there, since I was planning to buy a train ticket in Guilin). Maybe they'll take this into account.

I'll try this trick with refundable plane ticket if they reject me, but I hope it won't come to this, since this whole visa thing was already pretty expensive for me and I'd hate to pay the fee again.

>>1267888
wow

what nationality are you, and by "them" do you mean an agency, consulate, or border point post-visa clearance

I know some Russians who allegedly hitchhiked this route and they must have done as you say

but I seriously doubt this would work if you were using a southern entry port
It's probably just that they don't give a shit about the northern regions

>>1267892
I'm polish. yeah, "them" is the consulate (I was contacting it only via the agency, but as far as I understand, the agency only makes fake hotel reservations and not the fake plane reservations. So I guess it's indiscriminable from contacting the consulate personally)

As to the Russians - don't forget that Russia has a land border with China. This may change a lot in their policy. The diplomaic relations are also a possible factor.


And well, I don't know abot the southern borders. But to be honest -I think that it matters more that I'm a white european than that I enter from one point or another.
Of course the situation changes diametrally once Tibet and the "terrorist monks" come into the equation. Show any sign of sympathasing with them and say bye bye to all your visas.

Also, I doubt if giving a shit about some region of the country would cause them to treat you differenly - once you enter, you can travel wherever.
You are a tourist from the west, which means you are extremely likely to have loads of cash. You can travel wherever in the country you want. And you can become a bum wherever you get to as well. This is what they could care about, this is why they could be interested in forcing you to have a return ticket. Otherwise they don't care - why would they?

it's just a speculation, but just apply the logic here - if the policy requires any cash to be used, there must be a reason to enforce it. Now just think why would they care about you overstaying in their country. And think about what they think about europeans.

(sorry if I babbled in the post. I'm a bit light-headed now. If you want to ask about anything else, it may take me a couple of days before I visit here again, so bump the thread)

>>1267842
Airlines won't care

BUT for tourist visas it explicitly states that you need return flights.

So you may have fucked up here.

But Chinese regulations are pretty damn flexible, so who knows, they might not care and just give it to you anyway

Op here.
>>1268497
You've lifted my spirit a little, I'm also Polish and I thought it'll work against me if anything.
>>1268611
I know it's explicitly stated, I wanted to ask someone in the consulate about it, but they were so rude that I just gave up. I regret now that i didn't just give them fake return tickets, it would be much easier than obessesing about it now, when I'm running out of time and money.

>>1268611
Oh, yes airlines do care a lot because they have to fly you back if you are denied entry.

Friend of mine was denied boarding by Lufthansa, flying to China.

>>1268666
I'm Hungarian and I can confirm that the random Eastern EU nationality works in our favour in China. Also the Chinese visa authorities is Eastern Europe are more chill about the rules than the Chinese more to the West.

It's the combination that it's white, European, but not like Western Euro who would bring certain foreign ideologies with them, like free press and shit like that, we're more of their buddies than let's say Swedes or the Brits.

>>1268985
Huh, I always thought that the biggest concern for Chinese authorities would be people not leaving their country rather than them bringing some "wrong" ideology. And I can imagine that it's hardely the case that Brits or Germans wouldn't want to return to their country, while Eastern Europe countries are known for their high emmigration levels. But what you're saying makes a lot of sense, I hope you're right.

>>1269361
I've actually ran into some Serbian girl who worked illegally on tourist visa, but like... I guess there isn't enough of these cases for the Chinese to care (yet!).

OP here, it turned out I did get the visa! Thanks for your replies and support.

>>1270555
I just got a Chinese visa without an inbound flight or outbound from mainland China, I enter and exit via HK and I just wrote that in the Itinerary of the application showing the dates of expected Entry and Exit from Shenzhen.
I included hotel reservations etc as well, but they didn't worry about it too much.
She did correct me that I had to include HK arrival as my visa start date, but i just changed it on the spot and didn't get in to the geo-politics over why that might be incorrect haha.
Glad to hear it worked out.

>>1270555
woo hoo

have fun