BoganInParasite

We had a visit from my daughter, her husband and two kids recently...Aussies. We printed off various items from their passports and the wife took them to the local police station to report. All very pleasant, documents were filled out and some form of acknowledgement was issued. But the kicker was she was told still needed to drop the paperwork into the Nan IO, but not until next trip there (to Nan). She did so a few days later and was in and out in a couple of minutes.

13 minutes ago, IvorBiggun2 said:

^ What and how many photo's did you have to show.?

We provided four. One outside showing the house and house number, one sitting at the dining table, another on a living room sofa and the usual sitting on the bed. I recall last year we had a greater selection and they selected one outside and three inside.

I find the Nan office folks very helpful and pleasant, but sometimes... Was there today to lodge the paperwork for a second marriage extension. Had a freshly minted KR22 from the local office ready. They also wanted a copy of our (Australian) Marriage Certificate; missed that. Didn't have a copy printed but could access it from cloud storage and got it printed during the lunch break. Took it back. Accepted, but then clarified they wanted a Thai language version of it. Never heard of such a requirement. Thankfully found at home later in the day the certified Thai language version we had prepared last year to register our marriage in Thailand. Bit of a bonus, it was attached to an Australian Bangkok Embassy certified copy of our Marriage Certificate so with the grace of God or some other deity, we may get past this little challenge tomorrow.

Is it all of the passport pages, or just those with any stamps/visas/etc, or just those with Thai specific stamps/visas/etc? 

Way down on rain in the northern portion of the Nan River valley. Rice being planted very slowly and a number of fields largely drained a few days after planting, presumably to get water into other fields to plant. Still water running out of the Luang Prabang mountains but way down on volume. This time last year the weir near us was diverting a ton of water into canals either side and still had water coming down the face.

32 minutes ago, statman78 said:

You are absolutely correct.  Requirements vary by office.  Earlier this week I was in the Chiang Rai Immigration office and was to told that I needed to submit a TM 30 after spending a few nights in Bangkok.

Nan Immigration office don't seem to require them...the wife has asked a couple of times and we were told not needed. Since then have done two 90 day reports and a single entry re-entry application and nothing mentioned.

About five kilometers from Pua in Nan province. Six storms in last eight weeks, lost power in all of them. Not for long, longest maybe 90 minutes. Couple of other outages that turned out to be for planned installations/maintenance. One storm also cut the True fibre optic cable in two places. Was fixed within a day of us reporting it, seems we are the only folks using it in our locale. We have low voltage from PEA but as at least one person above said, nothing you can do about that other than your own mitigations. Village water has been strong and clean to date. All-in-all I'm reasonably happy with our utilities.

Been 22-34 here in Nan for weeks. Had a slight dip on minimums a couple of weeks ago and the same is forecast for next week. I keep asking the wife where this winter you promised is.

Must admit I was slightly disbelieving when one vendor no more than 400 meters away from our house wanted a map.

7 minutes ago, VYCM said:

This is so important in Thailand.

When you buy goods to be delivered from Index, Power Buy etc. they ask you to draw a map.

It makes sense as they don’t have a street directory to look up your location.

 

Back home you write your address and look it up in the street directory, you cant do that here.

We've purchased a lot of goods lately as we recently moved to Nan and are building a house at Pua. We have a Google Maps sourced picture of each address in the wife's iPhone photos. We send the appropriate one to the vendor via Line and to date all have accepted them and managed to find our leased home in Nan or the building site near Pua.

2 minutes ago, KevinboyCM said:

Why would they even ask that? Makes absolutely no sense at all. Your next 90 day report is 90 days from your last report date unless you leave the country and come back in which would then be 90 days from your re-entry date. 

I know, but they did.

Was at Nan Immigration two weeks ago getting a Single Reentry Permit and asked if I needed to report to them upon return from overseas. Said no. As this was not what I was expecting I had the wife ask and discuss in Thai just to confirm. Said no to her as well. I was doing the 90 day report as well and they even asked for my return date into the country to set the date for the next 90 day report.

On my first extension a few months back I provided Nan Immigration with a page that contained an annotated Google Maps picture, the actual address, the GPS coordinates and a photo of the house from the street. Nope, had to provide a hand drawn map.

The locals are telling me Nan has been hotter than usual this month. Normally starting to get a little cooler but it has been consistently within a degree or two of 23-33 this month. But the humidity has been lower. Not much wind either.

Went to Bangkok for three days last week, first time I'd been away from my residence since getting the 12 month ext based on marriage. Upon returning went to my local immigration office (Nan) to check if they needed anything. They said no, only interested if I was returning after leaving the country. But as other posters have said here and in other threads, seems to vary by office.

Less than I hoped, but more than elsewhere.

Moved to Nan three months ago. We tip around 10% and at times have encountered genuine surprised reactions from the servers in these family run restaurants, and a couple of attempts the not take the tip. The wife lets them know the money is because we are happy. We frequent a small number of these restaurants and there is no doubt our regular custom and tips lead to more focused service and lots of smiles. Perhaps the happiest reaction came from the smallest tip as was from the guy who delivers the large plastic containers of drinking water at 12 baht each. First tip was for two...24 baht, wife gave him 40 baht and said we don't need change. Really really genuine happy and surprised reaction from him. Unlike many who I suspect get their water dropped at the front gate/door, ours gets carried right to the back door. And we have been very happy to increase the tip amount. It took my Thai wife a number of years to understand why I tip when it is not required and she is now comfortable to do so herself. She can tip appropriately now in Thailand, Singapore, Australia, UAE and the USA where we have lived and always gets up to speed on tipping when we visit somewhere new.

I used an agent in Bangkok to smooth the way to open a bank account. Went well. Was going to use them to get the extension based on marriage in northern Thailand but they baled out, citing rubbish excuses. We are almost through that process ourselves and while it has been a little trying, it is far from impossible.

I may well be blessed. I visited Thailand 99 times for a total of 440 days in the period 2003-2017. All visa exempt. (My latest entry [the 101st] was on a Non-Immigrant O visa as I've now moved here.) In all those visits I can only recall one instance where there was a polite comment that I come to Thailand a lot. Told the truth, the wife lives here which was the case 2008-2013.

Just managed this for an initial extension based on marriage to a Thai. Was pleasantly surprised when the local branch of my bank had no problems issuing the letter...100 baht fee. Slightly surprised when the immigration office subsequently requested a bank issued account statement even though I presented the recently updated passbook and letter. Back to the local branch, no problems...another 100 baht please.