BritTim

Taking a Thai along can affect the way you are treated either positively or negatively. It depends on the sense the officials have of the status of the Thai. Thais are very status conscious. If they see your wife as "low class", they are liable to assume you are also. This is a genuine flaw in Thai society, and I would not blame you if it upsets you.

Unless the flight routing is an existing one that has a history of really being operated, beware cheap flights being promised over a month ahead.

There are a few officials where I believe this is genuinely true, often where the official has met with too many foreigners who act badly, and has the sense, as a result, that this reflects the character of all foreigners. However, in most cases, the worst you will experience (unless you initiate an argument) is an official who is bored silly and just wanting to get through the day so they can go home. It has been my experience that Thai officials are almost always polite, and often friendly.

That is a very Western way of looking at things. In Asia, the ability to keep a "cool heart" garners you respect. You can be firm in protecting your rights without being an a-hole. You, like many Westerners, think that you would not have achieved your point without being an ugly farang, but the reality is that you achieved (at best) only what you would have managed if able to keep your cool, while losing the respect of the Thais around you in the process. (I have had the experience of having embarrassed officials apologise to me quietly, out of earshot of the offending official, when one of their colleagues behaved badly towards me.)

Sigh! I do not think you have an unexpired Non O-A visa. You have a one-year extension of stay based on retirement with a multiple re-entry permit. What is not clear is whether you originally had a Non O-A visa from your home country, or a Non O visa from either an embassy/consulate abroad or from Immigration within Thailand. My guess is that it was the Non O which would make your experience (especially at Immigration when entering Thailand) absolutely routine. If, however, your original visa years ago was a Non O-A visa, you were very lucky to escape without 400k/40k health insurance. Others have been forced to buy it on the spot during entry into Thailand, as well as by their immigration office in order to get the one-year extension.

I am only familiar first hand with one small animal hospital in Pattaya. They had the care of a rather aggressive cat while the owner was hospitalised. Within a short time, they were able to hold and pet the cat when they were not otherwise busy. The cat had gained weight and was attached to them by the time she was returned to her owner. I do not think that hospital was a unique case. Some vets, especially in the small hospitals, are strong animal lovers.

That was my reading also of the rules. However, it has been reported by multiple people that some embassies (at least) do not demand the 400k/40k health insurance for a COE when you are re-entering with a retirement extension. That is different from getting a new Non O visa based on retirement where currently the health insurance always appears to be needed. I include a shout out to @ubonjoein case he wants to comment further on the above.

If concerned about the level of care your cat would receive, be aware that many good animal hospitals in Bangkok will provide boarding at reasonable cost. However, the logistics of getting your pet into the hospital could, indeed, be very tricky.

Before considering a 10-day visit, make sure the requirements for a Certificate of Entry (COE) are understood. The passport validity issue might be the least of the concerns.

This is my assumption as to what is going on. They want to stop people who have recently contracted Covid-19 in Thailand from immediately buying Covid-19 insurance, thus allowing them to get the best available treatment with the insurance company picking up the tab. If I am correct, there will be no problem if you are applying while outside Thailand, and required to show a negative test result before being allowed to travel to Thailand.

The amazing thing about Jomtien is the contrast between the different desks. Applying for retirement extensions at Jomtien is usually a pleasant process. On the other hand, those processing marriage extensions make Jomtien feel like a rogue office, making your life as difficult as possible in the hope of pushing you into the clutches of agents.

Double and triple entry tourist visas were discontinued years ago when the multiple entry tourist visa was introduced. The METV is only issued in your home country (or country of legal residence). At the current time, the METV is suspended. As all land borders with Thailand are currently sealed, the METV would not be useful for the kind of process you used in the past. Right now, there are regulations around entry into Thailand that make visits undesirable unless you have strong motives to want to come. There are relaxations in the works, but I recommend you wait to see how things develop over the next couple of months.

They most certainly are bribes. However, they fall into the type of corruption that is tacitly accepted by senior officials above them.

I do believe this is generally correct. However, there are rogue offices where, for reasons best not discussed, they make the application process for marriage extensions a miserable process.

In Thailand, the higher you go in the hierarchy, the greater the level of corruption. Ministers will not profit directly from the corruption at lower levels. However, they have many, many opportunities of their own, not least pocketing much of the profits from officials below them buying their positions (and the right to recover their investment). Corruption at high levels is not absolutely universal, but the exceptions are few and far between.

Quarantine requirements on entry are a completely separate matter than the class of visa one is using. It might make a significant difference for UK travellers who will now the able to travel to and from Thailand without quarantine at either end. Personally, though, I do not regard Thailand as an attractive tourism destination at the current time.

Be aware that reporting online, while very convenient, does not always work.

What kind of door lock was used on your hotel room in Phuket? In many cases, the hotel can tell when you enter and leave your room without ever actually seeing you.

I am not upset by your sarcasm. I have been known to indulge myself on occasion. However, let us recall the specific post that prompted my comment about the limited intellect of many Thai consular officials: I humbly submit that a short certificate in English issued by the EU (the bloc adjacent to the UK) ought to be capable of comprehension by an intelligent official at the Thai embassy in the UK.

It is based on long experience. I am not saying all Thai consular officials exhibit less than stellar intellectual abilities. However, their frequent inability to understand documents that are in a different form to those they are accustomed to is all too common.

Technically, any "printable" document can be printed as a PDF. However, not all bank apps support creating a printable statement in any format. You can save screen shots as images, and stitch them together as a PDF file, but that creates a more dubious looking result than just a single screen image that you can demonstrate to the official is genuine by showing your phone.

It depends on the bank's app whether downloading (or printing) a statement as PDF is supported.

Note that, if there is a trip where you are intending to be out of Thailand for only 3-4 weeks, it might be feasible to apply for a one-year extension of a Non O. You can get a re-entry permit to keep your permission to stay during the under consideration period intact, receiving your actual one-year extension on your return. The dates would need to line up cleanly, and some flexibility with your schedule probably necessary, but I would be nervous about relying on visa exempt entries continuously through the Bangkok airports (based on experiences in 2018-2019). I appreciate your point about the larger Thai establishment being keen to have more foreigners in the country, but I do not get the impression that this is a priority for the Bangkok airports immigration officials.

I sympathise, but the reality is that Thai embassies will typically only be familiar with the vaccine certificates issued within the country where they are operating. They are only used to verifying UK NHS certificates which use a different format. Do not expect high intelligence from Thai consular officials.

You do not mention the basis of your permission to stay. If it is for retirement, there should be no insuperable difficulty. However, an extension of your permission to stay based on marriage to a Thai is taken under consideration with a report back date. If that is your situation, plan instead on applying for a fresh single entry Non O visa prior to your return.