BritTim

The question I have is: if you qualify using both money in the bank and income, how does Immigration decide which qualification has been used for the last extension? How does your extension stamp differ depending on whether you previously qualified on income or money in the bank? I fully accept that, in practice, the officials may not approach this objectively, but compliance with the previous extension is achieved by either 65k+ baht transfer for every month during the term of the last extension; or maintaining the necessary balances in the bank. You do not need to do both. I would even argue that you ought logically to be able to change in the middle between two extensions, reducing the amount in the bank as soon you begin depositing 65k+ baht per month (though I would not expect any office to accept this in practice).

While I understand that travel is difficult for him, he seems well enough to be outside hospital. It is possible (for a price) to arrange a land border bounce using an ambulance. This is a one-time process, and may be worth the cost.

I 100% agree with your analysis. Also, in the highly hypothetical case where you no longer qualify for the continuation of your LTR at the end of five years, I am pretty sure your existing permission to stay would be considered as originating from a Non Immigrant visa. You would be able to apply for a one-year extension of your permission to stay based on retirement. Exactly what immigration would require in terms of money in the bank, monthly transfers and insurance is very murky, and I will not go there.

The use of an agent certainly may complicate matters. However, ignoring that, the use of income via monthly transfers is supposed to be an allowable means of qualifying for an extension. Let us say you applied for a Non O visa at Immigration using form TM87 (where I agree 800k baht in the bank will often be the only qualification that Immigration will accept). Will you ever be able to qualify for extensions based on income transfers? I would argue that this should be allowed, and you show you qualify by a bank statement with 12 monthly transfers of 65k baht from abroad. Once you are making these monthly transfers, maintaining the minimum balance in the bank should no longer be a requirement. Let us say you did in fact keep the money in the bank, so yet another year later you now have 24 months of monthly transfers. Must you show a statement with 24 months of monthly transfers to demonstrate that you qualified the previous year based on both income and money in the bank? Can Immigration again deny you based on the fact that you qualified the previous year via money in the bank?

For Thailand Elite memberships, there is no requalification at the end of each five year period. Under Thai Immigration law, the maximum possible length of a visa is five years. Placing the new five year visa in your passport is an automatic procedure for Thailand Elite, unlike with the LTR process.

A hint if you really want to pursue this: the fastest way is to charter a taxi to Pakse (a little under four hours) followed by a direct flight. This sort of travel in Laos is very costly. Really, better is probably to arrange a separate trip to Luang Prabang for the future.

If you have never been, Luang Prabang is well worth a visit. I hope you realise, though, that a quick round trip from Savannakhet to Luang Prabang is pretty difficult and expensive to pull off.

First, I completely agree that, if he does exit and re-enter, he is unlikely to be allowed the visa using form TM87 based on his 12 monthly transfers (though a few offices might allow this). Second, it is possible that the application for the extension of his existing permission to stay (without exiting) might be denied because of the previous use of agents. That is not inevitable. Depending on the office, switching from agent assisted to doing it yourself is sometimes possible.

If there is no visa sticker plus entry and exit stamps, there will be no visa fee. You will be charged something for the day pass (I would guess about US$10 for foreigners). This also means you do not need to worry about Thai re-entry permits.

This is true for all Thailand Elite applications. You do not need to make a final decision and pay until the application has been approved.

That depends on the immigration office. It should be possible, but (i) they may not like the fact that you used an agent previously; and (ii) some offices will insist that the 12 months of 65k+ transfer from abroad are not sufficient retrospective proof after an extension based on money in the bank [this is unreasonable, but known to happen].

This visa run company should know: https://www.chiangmaivisarun.com/chiang-mai-to-mae-sai-border-run-service/

Savannakhet is very busy, and they have an assembly line that they do not want disturbed. You do have the option of applying on a Friday and picking up on a Monday. That actually has the benefit that the consulate is not busy on Friday mornings.

For several years now, it has been a rogue crossing: many horror stories about Thai immigration at this crossing. Mae Sot (in my view a good choice when open) is also closed now. Ranong is preferable to Padang Besar which I would only consider if living in the South. Thailand and Malaysia have decided to enforce staying overnight in Malaysia at most border crossings when doing a border bounce as a tourist. A present to the officials is necessary to circumvent this policy. The amount varies. In general, your experiences with doing border bounces years ago are not useful in understanding the challenges this involves today.

An unlicensed and unattributed post from a private Facebook group has been removed.

Under no circumstances use Aranyaprathet/Poipet, however convenient it might seem from Bangkok. The Mae Sai crossing to Myanmar is reported to be closed. If you happen to be in the deep south, Padang Besar is possible, but you will likely need to pay a fee if you want to return the same day. Of the ones you mention, the Friendship Bridge at Nong Khai is the best. A good option if you are not far away is crossing from Ranong to Myanmar. There are visa run companies from Bangkok and Pattaya who will take you to border crossings with Cambodia (not Aran/Poipet). It is probably best to use these if you want to do a border bounce to Cambodia.

The Chinese buying Thailand Elite memberships are, in general dollar millionaires or close to it. In the main, they are business people who want to avoid visa hassles during visits, and who in general travel first class. By the way, your figures for the number of millionaires in China is way out of date. There are currently, at least, six million millionaires in China (second only to the US). See, for instance, https://www.statista.com/topics/5788/millionaires-in-china/. It is true that, per capita, this is still much lower than in some advanced economies. However, no one looking at the huge investments by Chinese in Cambodia, Myanmar and elsewhere in the region could possibly come to the conclusion that rich Chinese are not quite numerous, or that they do not spend time in Asia.

I have removed a bunch of posts which contained meaningless bickering.

The financial proof rules currently in effect were not well thought through, and are not enforced in the way some senior bureaucrats originally envisaged. In practice, the only penalty for failing to follow the rules of 800k for three months after the extension is granted, and for two months before the next one (and 400k the rest of the time) is that your next extension will be denied. There is no fine for non compliance. Jomtien has decided on a bit of enforcement theatre that has no real function.

The yellow book should not be essential for proof of address. If you have the chanote that identifies you as the owner of the condo, that should be sufficient to lodge the TM30 notification, and subsequently to do the 90-day notification using TM47 and your extension. Getting the yellow book can sometimes involve a lot of bureaucracy, depending on your local office, but it is not essential.

Before advising you, please clarify: When does your multiple entry visa expire? When does your current 90-day permission to stay expire?

Reports that I consider credible have reported that foreigners have been unable to cross for months. As against that, Google reports that it is open, and some recent Google reviews suggest the same. I think it is closed, but contacting someone at the bridge would be necessary to be sure.

I would be very interested in leads to booking sites that can sell you a one-way international flight out of Thailand for US$12. I have considered myself very clever in the past tracking down tickets at double that price.

1) Yes, with proof that the money was transferred from abroad or has been in the account untouched for several months. 2) Correct. Just tell them (if they query it) that you are still looking for a permanent place to live. All that is required is that a TM30 notification has been done by your hotel. Take proof of this to avoid one potential cause of friction.

Yes. The first on-year extension of a Non Immigrant entry is treated as concurrent with a 90-day report. That is not automatically true for subsequent one-year extensions.