If your final destination is the
United States or Canada, you may
come to the U.S./Canada either
through Atlantic or Pacific route.
For the Atlantic route, you may
have a stop over in London, Paris,
Frankfurt, Amsterdam etc. For the
Pacific route, you may have a stop
over in Singapore, Hong Kong etc.
During your intermediate
international stop over, if you have
sufficient time and you want to
tour the city and/or country, you
may apply for transit visa at the
appropriate counter at the airport.
A transit visa is a temporary short
period visa during your journey.
Some countries require that you
have a stop over of minimum of 24
hours to grant you a transit visa.
But Singapore provides a transit
visa for a stop over as small as 4
hours. They even have airport
transportation available at no
charge for a passenger tour.
Recently, several countries have
started to require a transit visa for
persons transiting their countries
even if they do not want to go out
of the airport. However, most
people who are going to or coming
from with a valid visa do not
require a transit visa. There has
been a lot of confusion in this
regard among people and many
times even airline staff does not
have correct information.
Check your flight details for transit visa.