registration

[Michele A. Berdy]

My general sense is that it's easier for an American to get a Russian visa than for a Russian to get an American visa, although there are exceptions to that rule. But my cry from the heart has to do with registration, with Russians don't have to do in America, and which has become an enormous headache for foreigners in Russia. 

Now you have to register when you arrive, get a card and carry it around. If you leave the city for more than 3 days, four days before your departure you have inform your company, bring back the card and "de-register" and then register wherever you go. If it's a hotel, they'll do it for you -- and they now have to register you and "de-register" you when you leave. (This is a huge amount of work for them; in the past they just put a stamp on your visa, but now they have to do two runs to the Federation Migration Service for every tourist.) But if you are visiting friends at their apartment or dacha, the first day you arrive you have to go to the FMS and register, and the day before you leave you have to return to "de-register." (I can't imagine that it's a 5-minute process either day.) Then when you get back to Moscow, you have to re-register. My employers don't know what I should do if I leave the city for a five-day road trip and don't stay more than a night in any one place. They think I wouldn't "de-register" in Moscow, but then that defeats the whole purpose of this, if the purpose is indeed to know where we all are. In fact, in the past the registration was at my place of residence, and now we are all registered at the office of our company. (That's what the internet visa guys do, too.) So the FMS is getting less information on where we are. According to the records, hundreds if not thousands of people are sleeping on the floor of offices.

You don't get a stamp anymore so you have no way of proving that you have complied with all this. So in my company several people who registered  and de-registered on time have been stopped at passport control because the computer system didn't show it. The same thing happens with tourists. They are fined -- usually $100. According to hotels, the tourists get hysterical and then want to sue them. But everyone was in complete compliance -- the problem is that the FMS doesn't have time to put the information in the computer system so that the border guards get it on time. 

Actually, this is all hearsay. I need to get registered under this new system, but my employer tells me that their guy at the FMS refuses to take their paperwork. He told them "I'm sick of you" and "I don't have time to do all this work."  I don't doubt it. It isn't onerous for a company bringing in construction workers or for anyone who arrives and pretty much stays in one place or stays in hotels. But for a newspaper with dozens of correspondents traveling all over the place, or any company with a lot of movement of staff and visitors, this is just nuts. And nuts for the guys at FMS trying to keep up with the paperwork.  

Sorry for nattering on so long -- but visitors should be aware of this. 






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