Arriving in Manila Nov 2021 experience

[Kby175 115]

As promised to a couple that are looking into heading to the Philippines, I have been traveling to the Philippines since the 90's and have never had so many hoops and hurtles to go through.  

 

This is a step by step please forgive any spelling or grammar mistakes I was just jotting things down as I went. Let me know if you have questions.  

 

Apply for Visa Philippine Consulate Houston

 

PCR-RT test before leaving the US (Did this to get 3 day quarantine)

 

Make hotel reservation before leaving US

 

Sign up One Health Pass 24 hours before departure 

 

Be prepared to sit and wait I was first class but all the OFW's get priority over all passengers to go through the system sat for about 30 minutes to get to step 1

 

Arrive in Manila talk with BOQ official One Health Pass barcode scan (Got lucky 3 day quarantine!)

 

Quarantine starts day one as soon as you arrive no matter what time you arrive

 

Second desk verify my hotel stay

 

Immigration they wanted arrival card, PSA wedding certificate and date of departure

 

Get my bag from stack of many bags (Baggage is chaos your bag better be unique by the time you get out there are rows and rows of

bags)

 

Customs drop off form

 

Before checking out of airport One Health Pass barcode scan

 

Find Taxi to hotel One Health Pass barcode scan before entering taxi

 

Arrive in hotel sign up for stay safe Philippines before allowed inside

 

Check into hotel One Health Pass barcode scan 

 

PADlab contacts me for swab appointment via email Day 2

 

 PADlab shows up for swab test One Health Pass barcode scan Day 3

 

PADlab results negative Day 4 (Lab will email you results but this not not reflected in BOQ until 6 pm the same day)

 

Wait for a few hours for results to be officially released (I can check out of the hotel at this point if I wanted and check into a dual purpose hotel aka quarantine and non-quarantine)

 

NOTE: If you are in a quarantine only hotel once you are released you can't come and go as you like

 

Download BOQ quarantine certificate Day 4 (Results officially released 6 pm following day of swab test)

 

Apply for S-Pass Travel Permit to travel to Bacolod Day 4

 

Called LGU to see status of S-Pass day and a half no approval flying in the next morning

 

LGU wanted a copy of my Stay Safe Philippines barcode 

 

Download S-Pass day 5

 

Things to come 6

 

Check out of hotel day 6

 

LGU pick up at local airport they will take me to my wife's town and verify all of my
documents

 

Once verified I can go to her house but I can't leave for another 9 days to complete the 14 day quarantine. Not sure if someone from the local LGU
will actually check at this point.

Edited November 29, 2021 by Kby175

[Snorkel378 38]

I have a question for you, if you are vaccinated, did they accept your cdc vaccination card? Or did you put that in to the health pass system to make it work for you?

[flicks1998 1,044]

With the way the Philippines has acted towards the Delta variant, its quite possible the travel restrictions/procedures/methods, etc will change with the new variant.  Once Omicron is detected in the US (and there is a 99.9999% chance its already there), the Philippines will most likely move it to the red list which they have done with most other countries that have been shown to have this new variant. 

Edited November 29, 2021 by flicks1998

[Kby175 115]

1 hour ago, Snorkel378 said:

I have a question for you, if you are vaccinated, did they accept your cdc vaccination card? Or did you put that in to the health pass system to make it work for you?

They accepted my CDC card, you have to enter it in the One Health Pass system, you can upload a picture of your card. I was tall enough to look over his screen to see I was pre-approved for a 5 day quarantine but then I showed him the PCR-RT test that had come in while I was on the flight to Manila and he went into the system and changed it to 3 days. 

[Kby175 115]

1 hour ago, flicks1998 said:

With the way the Philippines has acted towards the Delta variant, its quite possible the travel restrictions/procedures/methods, etc will change with the new variant.  Once Omicron is detected in the US (and there is a 99.9999% chance its already there), the Philippines will most likely move it to the red list which they have done with most other countries that have been shown to have this new variant. 

They have already started changing things, they have suspended the green list completely and it seems they are adding more and more countries to the red list as they go.  Just when it looked like they were about to open things up.  

 

Researchers still need a couple weeks to tell if we need to worry about this one or not.  

[Corgent 93]

5 hours ago, Snorkel378 said:

I have a question for you, if you are vaccinated, did they accept your cdc vaccination card? Or did you put that in to the health pass system to make it work for you?

I went through earlier this month. I uploaded my CDC card to OneHealthPass and the topic of vaccination never came up while I was processing through Manila airport - in person I was never asked if I was vaccinated, and never asked to present my vaccination card. I was automatically given 5 night, 6 day quarantine. 

[Bochog 10]

On 11/29/2021 at 2:31 AM, Kby175 said:

As promised to a couple that are looking into heading to the Philippines, I have been traveling to the Philippines since the 90's and have never had so many hoops and hurtles to go through.  

 

This is a step by step please forgive any spelling or grammar mistakes I was just jotting things down as I went. Let me know if you have questions.  

 

Apply for Visa Philippine Consulate Houston

 

PCR-RT test before leaving the US (Did this to get 3 day quarantine)

 

Make hotel reservation before leaving US

 

Sign up One Health Pass 24 hours before departure 

 

Be prepared to sit and wait I was first class but all the OFW's get priority over all passengers to go through the system sat for about 30 minutes to get to step 1

 

Arrive in Manila talk with BOQ official One Health Pass barcode scan (Got lucky 3 day quarantine!)

 

Quarantine starts day one as soon as you arrive no matter what time you arrive

 

Second desk verify my hotel stay

 

Immigration they wanted arrival card, PSA wedding certificate and date of departure

 

Get my bag from stack of many bags (Baggage is chaos your bag better be unique by the time you get out there are rows and rows of

bags)

 

Customs drop off form

 

Before checking out of airport One Health Pass barcode scan

 

Find Taxi to hotel One Health Pass barcode scan before entering taxi

 

Arrive in hotel sign up for stay safe Philippines before allowed inside

 

Check into hotel One Health Pass barcode scan 

 

PADlab contacts me for swab appointment via email Day 2

 

 PADlab shows up for swab test One Health Pass barcode scan Day 3

 

PADlab results negative Day 4 (Lab will email you results but this not not reflected in BOQ until 6 pm the same day)

 

Wait for a few hours for results to be officially released (I can check out of the hotel at this point if I wanted and check into a dual purpose hotel aka quarantine and non-quarantine)

 

NOTE: If you are in a quarantine only hotel once you are released you can't come and go as you like

 

Download BOQ quarantine certificate Day 4 (Results officially released 6 pm following day of swab test)

 

Apply for S-Pass Travel Permit to travel to Bacolod Day 4

 

Called LGU to see status of S-Pass day and a half no approval flying in the next morning

 

LGU wanted a copy of my Stay Safe Philippines barcode 

 

Download S-Pass day 5

 

Things to come 6

 

Check out of hotel day 6

 

LGU pick up at local airport they will take me to my wife's town and verify all of my
documents

 

Once verified I can go to her house but I can't leave for another 9 days to complete the 14 day quarantine. Not sure if someone from the local LGU
will actually check at this point.

Where did you get your taxi? From the airport or you had this pre-arranged with your hotel? If it's the former do you pay the cab driver, or you paid inside the airport before boarding the taxi?

 

How about the PADlab test, did you pay for in the airport, too?

 

Lastly, did they accept credit cards or do I need to bring some pesos?

 

Will be leaving in a few days and this travel rules are stressing me out. LOL

 

Thanks!

[Talako 786]

On 11/29/2021 at 4:31 AM, Kby175 said:

As promised to a couple that are looking into heading to the Philippines, I have been traveling to the Philippines since the 90's and have never had so many hoops and hurtles to go through.  

 

 

Thanks for the update on your travels.

[Bochog 10]

For those travelling to the Philippines, make sure you fill out online the One Health Pass (https://www.onehealthpass.com.ph/e-HDC/) at least 24 hours prior to your departure. It literally saved me a few hours!

 

At the check in PAL check-in counter in SFO, they ask for the QR Code that was generated after filing out the One Health Pass. When I arrived in Manila, that was the first thing that they asked. 

 

I got off the plane around 6-6:15am and was at my hotel in Quezon City (which is a solid 45 mins of travel) by 7:30am. Take note that I had 4 big suitcases which I had to wait for at the carousel, so it took me at least 5-10 minutes of waiting there.

 

Also, I would recommend getting Detoxicare for the required Covid test at the hotel. They offer an early swab option, which means that they can perform the swab as early as 12:00MN - 2:00 on the day of your scheduled swab and release the results within 8 hours. Ordinary swab starts at 6am and results would be released within 24 hours. This means that if your scheduled swab is on 19th of December, and you avail of the early swab, you can check out on the 19th as well, instead of getting the results the following day. The early swab costs the same as the regular one, but you need to prepay it online (you can pay the regular swab in-person when they perform the swab at your hotel)

 

Lastly, if you are a Filipino Citizen (or a dual-citizen), make sure to bring your Filipino passport so you don't need to fall in line at the immigration and you can just use their fancy passport scanner.

 

Hope that helps.

Edited December 17, 2021 by Bochog

[Kby175 115]

On 12/10/2021 at 5:08 AM, Bochog said:

Where did you get your taxi? From the airport or you had this pre-arranged with your hotel? If it's the former do you pay the cab driver, or you paid inside the airport before boarding the taxi?

 

How about the PADlab test, did you pay for in the airport, too?

 

Lastly, did they accept credit cards or do I need to bring some pesos?

 

Will be leaving in a few days and this travel rules are stressing me out. LOL

 

Thanks!

I just walked across to the normal taxi stand area and got a fixed rate taxi, the line for the metered taxi was too long and I don't mind paying a few extra pesos to save time.

 

No, you pay for the test at the hotel or directly to the person giving your test via pesos.  I changed money at the money changer before walking across to the taxi stand.

 

Sorry been without power due to the typhoon.