Lemsta69

You pay a fee to the agent. The agent then uses most of that fee to make a contribution to the Royal Thai Police Benevolent Fund. This pleases the senior officers greatly and so they use their powers of discretion and kindly waive the usual seasoning requirements ????

well if he gets a choice I'm sure he'll pick No. 1. Then proclaim himself as the bestest prisoner ever!

Relax man, I was just having a Steffi Graf ????

When he becomes the Prez again will he still be called 45 or 47? I'm new to this POTUS numbering slang.

They should outsource this to 7-Eleven so I can get my extension and me beers at the same time.

did you not click on the link to the VFS website?

I'm in Thailand now but I just checked my local Dan Murphy's and was quite shocked to see that have 5L goons for sale for 17 bucks. How can the nanny state let that happen?! ????

That's correct, first you must apply for a Non-Immigrant Visa. There are two options for retirement for people aged 50 years and over. There's rhe OA visa which gives an initial one year permission to stay, and the O visa which gives an initial 90 day permission to stay. The "Non-OA" can only be applied for in your home country and has more onerous requirements than the "Non-O". The Non-O can applied for either in your home country, or at your local Immigration office after you arrive in Thailand. If you choose the "arrive first" option then you can enter Thailand either visa exempt or on a tourist visa. After you arrive you can go to your local Immigration office and apply to convert your visa exempt or tourist visa to a Non-O. The conversion process requires you to show B800,000 in your Thai bank on the day you apply AND prove that the funds came from overseas. Except for Pattaya immigration office who want to see that the funds have been there for at least two months. The Non-O visa gives you a 90 day permission to stay from its date of issue and is marked USED as soon as it is issued. Towards the end of the 90 days you can apply for a one year extension of stay. To obtain the extra 1 year stay you still need the B800k in the bank but you don't need to show that it came from overseas. Instead you must prove that it has been in your Thai bank account for at least 2 months. Once your extra 1 year permission to stay has been granted you must keep the B800k in your bank account for 3 months afterwards. Then you can withdraw funds if required but you cannot dip below B400k. After that, if you want to stay another year you must top-up your back account to B800k at least two months prior to the expiry of your permission to stay. I think I covered most of the salient points but I'm not a master like Ubon Joe so no issues if anyone wants to flame me for any factual or grammatical errors ????

Agents are bad mmkay? People who use agents spoil it for the rest of us. Oh wait, I used an agent to get my retirement visa ????

I've read OJAS' post a few times and I can't see where he is saying that money in the bank is not required. Which part of the past have you that impression?

???????????????????? thanks, that gave me a nice chuckle ????

They don't let you send CAD instead of THB? Now that's just unfair.

well you learn something new every day. My old local Dan Murphy's sells those 5L Berri Estates goons for seventeen bucks. I used to get my Coopers Red delivered three cases at a time so I can be forgiven for being a bit out of touch ????

go the goon bag! Five litres too, that's bigger than I've seen 'em back home in Oz.

OP mentioned visa on arrival so I assumed that the rules had changed, like Indonesia. I was thinking of heading to Penang at the end of the year to meet a friend but I'm not going if I have to pay for a VOA and waste a page of my passport with the visa sticker.

what passport will you be travelling on? also what website were you consulting? this website says that only Indians and Chinese are eligible for Visa On Arrival. https://www.malaysia.gov.my/portal/subcategory/1543

I read the "we only provide information about TM30" to mean that the host would supply the necessary documents, or the login credentials for the online portal. I hope it all works out well for the OP. Landlords that can't be stuffed doing such an essential task for their tenants are just mean and should be hounded out of the industry ????

those are the best train trips aren't they? ????

it's not that good! ????

yes, there is a Thai intermediary back involved. that's how Wise's system works...they pay you from via a local banking partner and turn work out all the forex stuff behind the scenes.

la dolce vita

would rather be dead ????

I take it you're not from Australia?

I make such distinctions because I was taught that by a mate who introduced me to the place at the end of 1997. Except that he told me that three main areas were Pattaya, Jomtien and Nakluea. He didn't ever mention the Darkside and tbh I'm not sure if he'd ever heard of the place given that he spent his days getting plastered on Soi 6. Or maybe it wasn't a thing that long ago.

Indians seem to get a bad rap in Thailand so maybe that had something to do with the decision to force them to go through immigration? I had to do that in Singapore a few years ago when flying from Snooky to Jakarta with carry-on only. I knew in advance that this would be required but it was still rather annoying being faced with the reality. Fortunately SIN immigration are very efficient.