Passport requirements to enter South Africa

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pyffii

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Flew with Mrs Pyffii yesterday to J'Burg on QF 63 ( great flight but very low load ) and upon checking in at the First Class Checkin Sydney the lovely Lady wanted to see our passports specifically to see if we each had two spare consecutive blank pages in our passport...when I asked why she replied that is a requirement imposed by the SA government and if we didnt have any spare blank pages then we would be denied flying to J'burg...I had never come across this requirement before ( nothing that I could see or find on the Qantas web site )and to say we were stunned was an understatement...Fortunately we did have spare pages...Upon arrival in J'bug we presented ourselves at passport control and the pleasant duty officer duly stamped an existing page and stapled a small print out onto that page....So we were left with our blank pages and a puzzled look on our faces...Not too sure what all this means...Any other experiences ???
 
The requirement by the RSA for two clear passport pages has been the accepted rule for a long time. However, what happened to you also happened to us on arrival in February. Perhaps they are in the process of changing their requirements but the airlines have not caught up as yet?
 
Flew with Mrs Pyffii yesterday to J'Burg on QF 63 ( great flight but very low load ) and upon checking in at the First Class Checkin Sydney the lovely Lady wanted to see our passports specifically to see if we each had two spare consecutive blank pages in our passport...when I asked why she replied that is a requirement imposed by the SA government and if we didnt have any spare blank pages then we would be denied flying to J'burg...I had never come across this requirement before ( nothing that I could see or find on the Qantas web site )and to say we were stunned was an understatement...Fortunately we did have spare pages...Upon arrival in J'bug we presented ourselves at passport control and the pleasant duty officer duly stamped an existing page and stapled a small print out onto that page....So we were left with our blank pages and a puzzled look on our faces...Not too sure what all this means...Any other experiences ???

TIMATIC states the following:

South Africa (ZA)

Warning:
- Passports and passport replacing documents of all non-South
African nationals must contain at least 1 unused visa page

for entry/departure endorsements by South African
Immigration Service. This does not include the page reserved

for Observations or Amendments and Endorsements .

- Not applicable to alien residents of South Africa.

so I dunno where the second page is required? But there must be at least one.
 
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Well we arrived into JNB 3 times and left twice,the third by ship.All the stamps fitted on one page so we also wondered why the requirement.But they certainly do require it.When we arrived back from Zambia a fellow from the UK was denied entry as only one spare page.Also while we were staying in SA a case made the papers where an international model was excluded for that same reason.
 
...nothing that I could see or find on the Qantas web site....
It is the passengers responsibility to conform with entry requirements of the country you are visiting. You passport, visa’s, etc is nothing to do with the airlines.
 
It is the passengers responsibility to conform with entry requirements of the country you are visiting. You passport, visa’s, etc is nothing to do with the airlines.

Worth noting that the Qantas website provides a link for immigration and visas which actually provides incorrect information for some countries. In particular, transit without visa requirements for China are wrong. Anyone relying on the link provided by Qantas (which to be fair is an external source) would be unnecessarily out of pocket.

Always better to check a source such as TIMATIC (which can be accessed through some airline websites). Although it seems TIMATIC may not have the correct details for South Africa? :(
 
Interesting about the 2 double blank pages for entry into Sth Africa...2 years ago, I was going to enter Sth Africa twice, Zimbabwe once and Zambia once so was really worried about my passport running out of pages (http://www.australianfrequentflyer....ns/passport-running-out-pages-size-35660.html). BUT, the Sth African entry and exit stamp is standard size (ie small) and they all fitted on a 1/2 page of my passport so I'm glad I didn't get a replacement passport as it was then barely 5 years old....
 
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