Chinese Visa requirements in the Philippines

We got our Chinese visa!

Posted on November 5th, 2009 by Calvin

My wife and I will be travelling to Beijing, China at the end of this month for our early year-end vacation. My eldest sister who works there invited us and will be touring us. All of my family have been there except for me and my brother so I think it’s about time that I should visit the place.

Imperial Summer Resort in Chengde, China

We thought it would be easy to get a Chinese tourist visa because my sisters didn’t have any problems. They just showed a letter of invitation along with their visa application and passport and that’s it.

Sometime in September 2009, they made the requirements stricter. Here’s what we were required to bring to get a Chinese visa:

Application form with applicant’s passport-sized or 2×2 photo with white background
Passport (valid for at least 6 months)
Photocopy of Roundtrip ticket
Invitation letter or hotel voucher
Certificate of Employment
Photocopy of Company ID, SSS ID and contributions
Photocopy of TIN card ID and ITR
NBI Clearance valid for travel abroad (original copy)
Bank certificate (not photocopied) with a minimum of 50,000 in the account
Php1,400 application fee

If unemployed, a photocopy of sponsor’s bank certificate is required instead of CoE, Company ID and SSS ID and contributions.

The World Center

The Chinese Embassy in the Philippine is located at the 2nd floor of The World Center along Gil Puyat Ave in front of Mapua School of IT. Applying for Chinese visa is done in the morning and cut-off time is around 11PM when they will stop handing out numbers.

You are required to visit the embassy twice, once to submit your application and after 4-5 days, to pay and claim.

On our first visit, we arrived at around 10AM and were done by 12 noon. Making sure that our requirements are complete and correct, there were no questions asked at the embassy.

On the second visit, you have to get a number to pay for your visa and you will be given another number to claim it. It’s much faster this time around and we were done in less than an hour with our Chinese visa!

Chinese visa

So there you go. It’s not really that hard to apply for a visa. It’s the requirement gathering that is a pain to complete. I would like to thank my lovely wife for taking care of our application. I’m just here to document the experience. Hehe.

China here we come! It’s going to be a cold but exciting trip.

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Filed under: Travel

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Chona: hi Calvin, this is really helpful. I’ll be touring Beijing on December 8-12, 2012...
Calvin: thanks!! will check her out.
ionic: there’s another pinay who made it to hollywood…she’s kristen...
Calvin: yeah to counter it, just put enough money when you’re going to use it.
TJ: Yup, very handy indeed. Your post contained exactly what I was thinking. I tested it...

barry says:

January 14, 2011 at 8:08 pm

question: hi i’m 23 but i am not yet employed, still studying, but my sister (employed) here in the Philippines plans on touring beijing. she plans to bring me along. we have no relatives in china. how can i apply for a visa with this situation? thank you

Calvin says:

January 18, 2011 at 11:31 am

hi barry, according to my sister in china. hindi nya raw alam ang sagot. hehehe. pero suggest nya sabay niya yung application mo sa application nya and she show proof na kaya kang ma-support pag nandun na. maybe bank records, i dunno.