ben2203

Should I trust them too? I mean, really I'm just another farang with a PhD from a really good school. That means I'm basically the same as a Burmese house boy to them, right?

It's probably more so arrogance and jealousy, you probably have what is considered to be a very high salary which means that you have to take a considerable amount of flack and jump through numerous hoops for their gratification, regardless of your background.

Personally, I would just apply for a visa extension yourself, if they refuse to give you one without the necessary paperwork from Thammasat, leave the country and come back in which effectively cancels the non-immigrant F visa and puts you on a tourist visa and save yourself a lot of hassle and money, though you're still essentially forking out for the trip.

By the way, Chinese Universities actually pay a significant amount more than Thai universities.

Actually, this is kinda ludicrous, an American PhD holder from a reputable western university is getting given the run around and given false information and made to renew his contract every year.

I kinda like Asia Sermkij, for one, they put the book in your name and then just keep the book until you've paid everything and then they just call you and say, you've paid, come and collect the book.

Thannachart in my experience is ok, they probably think that as a farang you are incapable of paying debts because that's a Thai thing.

As people have said though, it's probably just the person who came to visit you.

Do as Samran advises, he advised me on the exact same issue a few years back.

Basically, at land borders they are not used to dual Thai nationalities so it's better to use an airport. I got asked at the airport why there was no exit stamp in my Thai passport and I just showed them my British passport and they let me in but told me to use the Thai passport for entry and exit to Thailand and the British passport whenever I needed it. Basically, two minute check and that was it.

You can also use the auto gates too but the police at the airport know a lot more than the police at the borders.

Hi there,

I recently overstayed by 1 day, I went to the local immigration office prior to the overstay and explained I wanted to stay the extra day, I was informed not to worry about 1 day. On arrival at the airport immigration pulled me into the office, charged me 500 THB and stamped my passport!! I now worry this may cause me problems returning or obtaining Visa's in the future....this was my first violation....any thoughts or advice is very welcome :-)

Nah, the stamp in your passport just says you were fined and the amount of your fine, I had to pay about 3000 once because I had left my passport in my shirt and thrown my shirt into the washing machine, DOH, it takes so long to get a new passport so I couldn't get a visa until that time. I just explained it to them and then they took the money, stamped the passport, took copies of all the other stuff and that was it.

I guess if you had a lot of those stamps in your passport somebody who didn't like the look of you might want to make a problem for you but it's doubtful.

You're not going to be on a blacklist for a 1 day overstay, people overstay all the time.

Adrenaline kicks in after a vehicle pursuit and altercation.

Too bad the drunk chose to endanger all those lives when he chose to drive drunk and resist arrest.

What the drunk did doesn't matter! Absolutely no excuse for a policeman kicking a handcuffed man in the face. In most civilized countries the cop would be suspended without pay pending an investigation and probable criminal assault charges.

But here I imagine he will be back on active duty in a month or so. Very sad.

This is how Thai police work

All down to lack of vehicle maintenance i reckon,ie,brake failure,more than likely a maintenance issue,maintenance is an ugly word in Thailand.

Usually, it's shoddy engineers, you don't pay them enough or love them enough sometimes you get shoddy work.

So if they don't have any victims/evidence they were involved in the scam then why link them to it, is it because they are Nigerian? Why not just run the story as 4 Nigerian men arrested for overstay.

I guess it's a way of publicising it too. I know a person who fell victim to this scam only two days ago. Deposited 30,000 baht into the account and then said it's not enough have to deposit an extra 82,000 baht.

She realised it was a scam after she sent the money to the account, went to the police station in her home town, not pattaya, and they weren't interested but did tell her that the bank account was opened in the name of a girl who was born only a month earlier, so where they are getting the details from, who knows?

Fortunately, these scams have been going on for a while so it's not easy to be tricked but I somewhat feel for the average Thai with no qualm against the world and lose a substantial amount of money to such thievery.

Before people start banging their drums about serves Thais right for tricking countless others. It's not nice whatever the nationality.

Go to the vet asap!

Vets probably won't put her down, although you see it as her suffering, it's a sin to take a life so Thai people don't like to kill things, that includes, insects, rodents, animals etc.

Though, there are exceptions but it probably won't be offered as a service.

Just ignore it. What personal details of yours does she have

Address, number, all the usual. She has certainly been to the police, she took photos there along with some sort of report.

I would like to go to the appointment, because perhaps I'll get the 30 grand back which she tricked me out of. She says I 'damaged her reputation' by posting about it on facebook. But I'm not the one who was sleeping around? I don't think I'm in the wrong, but this is thailand, i know the laws here are quite different from back home. I did make posts baring all the details which all her FB friends could see.

(For some context, I'm 25 and working here for 3 years now, she's a first year college student. I thought too young to trick me for money!).

Just counter sue her, that's what Thai people do, it happens all the time.

I don't know about the 30,000 though, I doubt you will get it back

Locked up for 1-2 hours then let out with a 200B fine and a stern warning not to do it again.

The crackdown that works.

They could only nick them for not carrying ID cards, an offence has to be committed before they get arrested hence the reason they got nicked for 1-2 hours and only a 200 baht fine.

Unfortunately, even crooks have rights.

Unfortunate, 40,000,000 is quite a significant amount of money to lose.

It's possible that you could leave the country with just those documents but I think it would be pretty unusual and also take a lot of time to sort out at the airport. I would suggest going to the ministry of foreign affairs and getting a Thai passport there, explaining the situation with the mother and let them issue a travel document rather than risk possibly not being able to fly.

Essentially, he is Thai now, regardless of the British Passport. So that being the case, you do have to get a Thai passport basically.

The rule is, in and out of Thailand on Thai passport, if you come in on your british passport, you are thus British regardless of if you have a Thai passport, ID card etc. The same logic would be used going out, I would guess.

Some immigration police could overlook it, get the documents copied etc, but getting them there at the right time etc. Doubtful, I would say MFA and explain to them, takes 15 minutes to process it and it's ready within 3 days, or chaeng watthana anyway.

How strange that in less than a week the Army can pay the farmers but the PTP exgovernment couldn't manage to do the same thing in more than 9 MONTHS.

Well there is always somebody throwing spanners in the works

20 satang, the cost of the bag not used

what bullsh"t, i think the purchase dept at Tesco Lotus need to have a talk to the supplier as he is ripping them off (try 3-4 satang)

There is no 3-4 satang, satang denominations are 25 and 50, and 100 satang make 1 baht. Were you thinking of baht, perhaps?

How many criminals do ya think really use these CHEAP visa services or make this trip themselves to Ranong??

Most criminals I know have money to burn or launder and use air travel usually buisness class to do there visa runs..

All paid for with other peoples money...

Maybe has something to do with Burmese labourers then perhaps?

Though, isn't that rule supposed to apply to all entry points?

when will all this stop ,we marry thai lady ,build house here come and live ,most of cause no problems ,we support there parents,educate there children ,then get hard time from the government ,visa runs ,our thai wife can come to the west get visa for life without any investment ,can start new life with no problems from the government /work,in the UK free health care ,,about time thailand ,gave as old gents little respect for our efforts ,for sure marrying a thai lady is better than ending up in a OAP home ,well maybe ,and well maybe cheaper

Get a marriage visa

I think you missed his point. Even with a marriage visa there is the bullshit of 90 day reporting, renewing every year. In most 1st world countries, once you have been accepted for long stay, there isn't the constant bullshit of 90 day reporting and visa renewing for the rest of your life...once you're in, you're in.

You can get a residency permit or/and be put on a trebbian baan book, a yellow book which means that you wouldn't then have to report your address to immigration every 90 days, I believe that is the case.

You can also post them to immigration apparently, I never did as I wanted to be sure that it was done, you can go to every immigration bureau, once I was in Loei as there was a flood in Bangkok so I went to the immigration place in Chiang Khan, those there though asked for a tip which of course you don't have to pay, I gave him 100 baht so he could chip in and buy some whisky though you need not pay it.

"

1. Photocopy of passport pages with following pages

   - front page showing name / surname / Passport No., ect.

   - current visa

   - last entry stamp of immigration

   - last extension of visa

2. Photocopy of departure card TM.6 click to view Example TM.6 card
3. Previous notifications of staying over 90 days (if any) click to view Example document
4. Completely filled in and signed notification form TM.47 click to view Example document (Don't forget to sign name.)
5. Envelope with 10 Baht stamp affixed and return address of foreigner for the officer in charge to send back the lower part of form TM. 47 after having received the notification. This part must be kept for reference and for future notifications of staying over 90 days.
6. The above mentioned documents must be sent by registered mail and the receipt of the registration kept by the foreigner.

   Send the mail before the renewal date 15 days to Immigration office

   Notice :

   - Your registered mail must be sent to the Immigration office at least 15 days before the due date of notification.

   - Your new form will be stamped as of the expiration date of your old receipt.

   - Please keep your receipt of your registered mail in case of lost mail.

   - Your document can not be processed if you have passed the 90 days limit. ( You must come to the nearest immigration office or Immigration Division 1 in person to pay fine 2,000 Baht)

   - Waiting for reply mail over 1 month, please contact Immigration Office with your registered mail receipt. "

Shame it can't be done online though.

This comes from the immigration website, so you can send it by post, at least a week beforehand and by registered mail, retain the slip and if you haven't received anything within a month contact them with the slip and provide new documents, etc, everything should be fine and more convenient then.

when will all this stop ,we marry thai lady ,build house here come and live ,most of cause no problems ,we support there parents,educate there children ,then get hard time from the government ,visa runs ,our thai wife can come to the west get visa for life without any investment ,can start new life with no problems from the government /work,in the UK free health care ,,about time thailand ,gave as old gents little respect for our efforts ,for sure marrying a thai lady is better than ending up in a OAP home ,well maybe ,and well maybe cheaper

This is unfortunately the problem, I think it has to have something to do with the Russian gangsters and the story about them killing somebody over a debt, actually they were going to murder the wife also but she herself stabbed herself in the neck and they thought she was dead anyway so they only killed the guy. Point is those people have yet to be found and I guess they are wanting to get rid of some of these types, which is good in a way.

If you are married then you can get a renewable yearly visa based on marriage in any case, the only pain is the three monthly address reports but I think those can be done away with, if you are in the trebbian baan which also means you can buy cars and motorbikes and put them in your name as you there is an address to register the vehicle too, so that is an added bonus of being on the electoral register, though you of course don't have the right to vote though.

Even if you are a teacher you can also get a yearly renewable visa based on employment too.

Also, the immigration have been good in warning people not to leave to Burma as there is no embassy or consulate there so they could get stranded, I think normally they wouldn't bother.

Moral is if you are going to do an armed robbery, steal a car and rob a shop that is not in your local locality, especially as small as koh Samui, you can drive around it in like 30 minutes, can't you?

Looks like they are all mates, and after all the paperwork has been finished are going to get lashed together at a local karaoke joint.

Let me just add that there is no village, they live in bkk.

there are no debts. They are pretty loaded.

Sounds like they value their daughter, do you have 5 million and do you feel that she is worth it or is it the principle because you are not Thai and don't agree with sindod? You can say you don't agree with sinsod but how they take it is, hmm, well??

Maybe, the other daughters got that so that's why she asked for it, keep up with the jones', ask the other daughter's husbands what they paid perhaps?

It would be interesting to know what employment someone who obtained citizenship actually had in Thailand?

I think they would mainly fall in the financial services category of employment or would have been wealthy enough to buy citizenship with false employment and large bribes. (I might be completely wrong on that)

Yup. You are completely, totally, wrong.

I can't even balance my check book, much less work for a financial services company.

Everyone I have met through this process has been an ordinary person, like me. Not rich. Not powerful. And certainly not paying any bribes.

I had a small company making small profits and employing only a small number of people (less than twenty). Many times money was so short I couldn't make payroll.

There are so many wildly incorrect assumptions and misunderstandings about the citizenship route, it's almost comical. It seems that people are almost making up excuses why they think it is impossible for them, to justify not getting off their butts and putting in an application. Sad, really.

Ha ha, again, the more you post and give your two cents worth of basically good information, the more the topic will be changed or your post will be ignored.

I read an article yesterday actually from the straits times that a Thai passport is ranked quite low on those accepted with visa free issues and no restrictions basically because many Thais go missing when they enter foreign countries that it becomes problematic for foreign governments.

@newlymintedthai

Ha ha, yeah I am coming to that conclusion

Samran's done it. Why not ask him?

Samran is Thai by blood, the law stipulates that anybody born to either a Thai mother or Thai father whether born in Thailand or not is thus Thai from birth.

If he was born outside of Thailand it is quite common not to have any documentation relating to Thailand as embassies are pretty scarce in major capital cities etc.

What everyone is talking about here is being naturalised through marriage, this is an entirely different kettle of fish and requires going through an application process, similar to in the UK where they have to go through the home office application to be natualised, usually what happens is you lose the nationality of your birth country but I know of instances where an American was naturalised but kept his American Nationality too, he was told to change his name to a Thai name so it was complicated for him to travel, I have no reason to disbelieve him otherwise.

One becomes Thai in one of three ways, by blood, jus sanguinis or jus soli though the latter has caused problems in the past. I read of a non Thai, (i.e. neither mother or father being Thai though realistically Thai people consider people with both parents Thai, Thai.) having Thai nationality through birth here but when she gained employment in Phuket her nationality was taking away from her as other people had problems with it but she had Thai nationality from bith up until she was 18, she probably was told like most Thais are in foreign countries to choose one nationality or the other, though at this current time, dual nationality is becoming more relaxed all over the world.

Naturalisation is a different process but there is a process in place to become naturalised, in Asia not just Thailand, it's basically who you know and not what you know though knowing the law is important as sometimes people will give you the runaround.

Good post but just a couple of points.

- there is no forcing to give up the foreign citizenship, but there is a limp wristed attempt to say you I intend to, but it is unenforceable.

- dual nationality hasn't been an issue under Thai law since 1992. The law only provides a window for a child with a foreign parent to give up Thai nationality between 20 and 21. If they don't there is no penalty.

- who you know has actively been discouraged when applying for Thai citizenship. We could have wheeled out the big guns. Former ministers, deputy permanent secretaries and a utility regulator or two. Sons and daughters of some of Thailand's richest families. It was actively discouraged and our application has been considered on its merits. Hardly a hi so application.

And that is the whole point. The process is straight forward, transparent for the most past (except for the timeframe of a the ministerial sign off). The special branch police fall over themselves to be helpful. But for some members here, stepping off their barstools is all a bit too hard for them.

Yeah, I was talking from a naturalisation perspective, Thai by birth, whether you have another nationality or not is that Thai by birth.

From a naturalisation perspective (I believe), One should have somebody who can provide a character reference at least, though I understand what you are saying, people will think that you bought your way in etc.

People, actually ask me that even family, and I always say yeah, it was 20 baht, the cost to copy the documents, it actually cost more than that though as I needed to get other documents officially recognised etc.

What it seems to me to be is that a small amount of people here just like to argue the toss, it could be that they don't speak Thai so this causes the issues with understanding how the law works, though there are translated versions etc so people should just say Thanks Samran, nice one bud, I will check it out rather than attempt to belittle him, just saying, outsider's point of view.

The process also involves a small amount of language proficiency but I read that some people weren't even willing to do that . My belief is that some people just want to say this is wrong, that is wrong etc and rant basically.

I mean the idea is you are becoming Thai, that would mean you are able to read and write in Thai at least, of course ethnicity wise you are not Thai but even a large number of non Thai people can speak, read and write to some proficiency, perhaps the people who argue with Samran about this should rethink that??

An English friend of mine yesterday did just that talking about universities in Thailand and getting paid 1,000 baht per hour for English Language Instruction was deeply offensive to him, this discussion went on for at least two hours and got to the point where he was basically screaming and shouting at me why I should change Thai laws, like I can .

If citizenship could be easily obtained through marriage, how many marriage shops would we see open across the Kingdom? There's already a load of dodgy student visa places where a visa can be bought for between 15,000 - 20,000. I am sure people would then just offer to marry someone for say 100,000 to enable said person to get a citizenship.

Though naturalisation is possible

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_nationality_law#Naturalisation

Now, who wants to assimilate?