UAE Visa Rates go up

[Kip Powick]

The United Arab Emirates embassy in Ottawa has announced it will be charging Canadians up to $1,000 for visas starting next week – seemingly punitive pricing that exceeds global norms.

But the fees as posted on the embassy’s website are questionable, since they don’t square with what others are charging Canadians for the same travel documents. UAE-based airlines and hotels are already facilitating the new visas now required for visiting Canadians, but they are not charging unduly harsh rates.

Canada to leave Dubai base

No citizen of any other Western country needs a visa to enter the UAE, which announced months ago that Canadians would lose their favoured-guest status amid an ongoing bilateral row over aviation rights. The policy is to take effect Jan. 2, though the precise details have never been officially spelled out.

In recent months, UAE officials have kicked hundreds of Canadian soldiers out of a secret military base in Dubai, threatened to keep Canadian-made BlackBerry devices out of the local market and even accused Ottawa officials of harbouring Israeli Mossad assassins.

All of this has taken place amid the Conservative government’s refusal to open more Canadian routes to Dubai-based airlines, after the rulers of the Persian Gulf nation thought they had built up considerable goodwill with Ottawa.

The UAE embassy in Ottawa quietly posted a new policy saying it would be seeking $250 for a 30-day visa for Canadians, $500 for a three-month visa and $1,000 for a six-month visa. Embassy officials could not be reached to confirm the pricing structure. The embassy reopens on Wednesday.

If the embassy charges the posted fees, Canadians who plan to visit the UAE are better off arranging their documents through Dubai-based airlines. The Etihad Airlines website says the airline can facilitate a month-long visa for visiting Canadians at a cost of only $83, while representatives of Emirates Airlines said their fees are slightly less. Neither had information about any three-month or six-month visa rate.

The airlines' rates for Canadian visas are more in line with global norms than those advertised by the UAE embassy, which are roughly triple the going rate.

Whatever the price of the new visas, they will represent an inconvenience for Canadians visitors who had been accustomed to paying nothing to enter the UAE.

The new fees, as announced on the UAE embassy website, “would drop down my visits,” said Saif al-Naib, a 27-year-old MBA student at Toronto's Ryerson University.

The Canadian citizen was born to Iraqi parents who work in Abu Dhabi. He said he typically visits his family there at least once a year but said if expensive new fees are enacted, he might reconsider. “If there's no real reason for me to go down, then I might hold off.”

He said the Canadian government will have to offer up some sort of olive branch to the Emirates if it wants to see the visa requirements waived. The rulers in the Persian Gulf nation “ have a lot of pride and they won't back down,” he said.

Canadian Dany Assaf, a lawyer who moved to Dubai this year to open an office for the Bennett Jones law firm, said Canadian diplomats have specifically told him Canadians are not being singled out for any higher visa rates.

“I did speak with our consul-general here on Monday and they gave me the numbers. What they told me was Canada is not being treated any differently,” he told The Globe and Mail in a telephone interview from Dubai. “They have not created any new categories or laws or anything for Canada,” he stressed, pointing out that the hotels, airlines and other businesses are now charging Canadians the same rates as what is charged other foreigners who require visas.

More than 25,000 Canadian citizens reside and work in the UAE. It’s also estimated that more than $1-billion is traded between the two countries annually. Business groups are complaining that the visas will inevitably affect trade and travel.

A Canadian government spokeswoman said Monday she could not speak to the visa issue, beyond acknowledging there is one. “The decision to impose visas on Canadians travelling to the UAE was made by the UAE in 2009 and is now being implemented,” Melissa Lantsman, a spokeswoman for Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon, said in an e-mail.

[rudder]

The response should be simple and direct - cancel all UAE based airline landing rights in Canada. No Canadian based airline has plans to fly to UAE anyway. Emirates needs Canada more than Canada needs Emirates. Evicting the Canadian military was a gross strategic mistake.

[chris]

Maybe the GTAA should consider upping the fees of de-ice fluid for them. Or we could just increase the price of visas for UAE tourists too.

[J.O.]

Just keep throwing your toys out of the sandbox folks (pun intended). That's a sure fire way to get the world to think that you're a mature trading partner.

[Ex 9A Guy]

These folks are not used to being told "No" and now they are behaving like the spoiled brats that they are. I say equivalent fees for UAE nationals to Canada and a special premium for de-icing the A380 as it it is soooo much more labour intensive.

If my son behaved like this he would spend some time in his room pondering his poor behaviour.

[inchman]

Apparently, if a pax books on EK, they pay the normal VISA fee... about a third of the fee paid directly to the embassy. Of course, this is just another slimy way for the UAE "government" to feed money into one of their prince's purse.

According to yesterday's Globe, there is a movement afoot among the industries that do supply services to UAE to agree to their terms.

Anyone who cares to put these crybabies in their place should make sure their MP knows how they feel. And maybe one of you ALTA guys should be pointing out to Stelmack that his next speech about the airlines will be complaining that everyone going to FRA or LHR has to go through the center of the universe to get there. Of course, it will be AC's fault, not the fact that HE encouraged EK's arrival in YYC.

On top of this, the GTAA gave them REDUCED (if not FREE) landing fees for their first year of operation into YYZ.

[inchman]

Inchman

By the by it is Stelmach not Stelmack and there will be an opportunity soon ( at the next election) to either support his POV or kick him and his buddies. My money is on the WildRose Alliance.

Geez.... I even looked it up, but missed the "h". You should have seen my first spelling!

[cavok]

On top of this, the GTAA gave them REDUCED (if not FREE) landing fees for their first year of operation into YYZ.

And the rest of the story: The GTAA gave a lot of airlines reduced (if not FREE) landing fees. It was part of an incentive program during the recession to encourage new routes. Both ACA and WJA were also recipients of these incentives.

All of the information regarding this incentive program was available at the GTAA website while the program was in effect.

[GDR]

The United Arab Emirates Embassy in Ottawa says charges levied against Canadians to enter the U.A.E. are no different than the fees paid by citizens of other countries who need visas.

On its website, the embassy said fees for all visas "are applicable to all countries without exception."

The statement follows an announcement earlier this week that Canadians would be charged $250 for a 30-day single-entry visa, which must be obtained before travel.

A six-month, multiple-entry visa would cost $1,000, with a maximum stay of 14 days during each visit, the embassy said.

"The embassy would like to add that the categories of visas and related fees as posted on its website are part of a universal visa system which is used by all U.A.E. missions abroad without exception," the website statement said.

Canada was previously among the 30 countries granted visa waivers by the U.A.E., but the embassy announced in November that Canadians would be required to obtain visas ahead of travel to the country starting on Jan. 2.

That move was part of a diplomatic spat between Ottawa and the U.A.E. over airline landing rights at Canadian airports. It also saw Canada evicted from a key military base in Dubai.

http://www.cbc.ca/politics/story/2010/12/30/fees-visas-uae-canadians.html

[inchman]

And the rest of the story: The GTAA gave a lot of airlines reduced (if not FREE) landing fees. It was part of an incentive program during the recession to encourage new routes. Both ACA and WJA were also recipients of these incentives.

All of the information regarding this incentive program was available at the GTAA website while the program was in effect.

True, I suppose, but in that same quarter that they announced that program, the AIF went from $20 to $25, actually increasing costs for passengers of entrenched carriers, encouraging even more passengers to use BUF and forcing existing customers to subsidize new entrants. It reminds me of that bank commercial where the adult gives ice cream to the new kid while the existing "customer" looks on.

The 50% rebate was for airlines that "increase service over the course of a year", whatever that means. If AC adds 100 seats overall, do they get a rebate on all their services to YYZ? Don't think so. But Emirates DID get the full rebate on ALL of their services to YYZ, just by adding some seats on an existing flight. Is the rebate program still in effect and if we get whipped into allowing them to provide daily service, will this extend their 50% ride even further because it is an "increase in service"?

[inchman]

The United Arab Emirates Embassy in Ottawa says charges levied against Canadians to enter the U.A.E. are no different than the fees paid by citizens of other countries who need visas.

On its website, the embassy said fees for all visas "are applicable to all countries without exception."

This is just more of the slimy word twisting one might expect. The fact is that there are over 30 countries whose citizens do not require visas... basically then entire first world and UAE's close arab allies.

And now, in a further slime move, EK is offering visas at 1/3 the published price... Helps if your dad/uncle/cousin/brother runs the immigration department, I suppose.

What a great marketing tool the government of UAE has handed them ... "If you connect through FRA on LH to get here, your visa costs you 3 times as much than if you fly on EK."

[AME]

I wonder?????

Dubai puts StandardAero up for sale:

NEW YORK | Fri Dec 10, 2010 3:12pm GMT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) has put aviation services company StandardAero on the auction block and retained Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) to advise on the sale, people familiar with the matter said on Friday.

State-owned DAE has opted to entertain offers for part or all of StandardAero -- which it bought from private equity firm Carlyle Group CYL.UL in 2007 -- after several potential strategic and financial buyers expressed interest, two sources said.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE6B93I520101210