Sri Lanka offers all foreign visitors to the country a 30-Day visitor’s VISA through their official government website. You can apply, pay for and receive the VISAs online for approximately $35USD depending on your country of origin.
However, be sure to read all the requirements of entry into Sri Lanka carefully. Along with your approved VISA form you also must be able to prove you have an exit flight, some accommodation organised and on rare occasions, prove you have sufficient funds.
Now this makes extending your VISA beyond the 30 Days very difficult as you can only apply for a visa extension by going to capital (Colombo) and visiting the “Department of Immigration and Emigration”.
However to be allowed into the country you first need to book and prove you have an exit flight within the 30 days of your VISA period. This forces travelers to either buy cheap flights to India or the Maldives that they will never use or spend a lot of extra money on Flexi tickets to allow rescheduling of your departure date after you extend your VISA. Since Sri Lanka is an island there is no easy way to show an exit ticket by bus or ferry like you can in other countries.
One other option that we heard about but would not have worked for us is to book an exit flight just before you board your flight to Sri Lanka that has 24hrs of free cancellation, and then as soon as you get through immigration control you cancel the tickets. This could work for smaller shorter flights into Sri Lanka but not from NZ.
To extend your VISA give yourself a full day in Colombo so you can start early at the “Department of Immigration and Emigration” at 8.30am and take a book with you because it will take 3-4 hours of waiting in various ques to get through the process. For information regarding the VISA extension process in the Emigration Department, see this helpful link:
https://www.ceylonrusticguide.com/rustic-guide-to-extend-visa-in-sri-lanka/
Sean and Marlous travel diaries 