sandyf

You talk about moving to Thailand, so you will require a visa. The requirements you posted relate to a visa extension. You will need to meet the financial requirements required for the visa you choose.

Ah, That would explain the queue I was in Austria.

I was in the UK during May & June and there were billboard notices everywhere that passports were taking 10 weeks. With a backlog of about half a million it would be wise to err on the side of caution.

And you think that makes a difference regarding his grossly exaggerated statement. "due to near impossibility of getting a Non O from RTE London. (so many conditions and requirement)"

Tell that to the people in the queue.

How was that applied for? London has been on the E-visa platform since 2019 and the ME option has never been available for Non O retirement or marriage from E-visa. Are you sure it wasn't O-A.

It is not getting any better. More than 550,000 passports were waiting to be dealt with at the end of June and it now takes on average around 10 weeks to process 10 per cent or 55,000 applications instead of the standard three weeks, the Commons Home Affairs Committee was told. https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/half-a-million-miss-holidays-passport-delays/

I got an Non O based on marriage last week, not much of a problem. Applied on the 18th July, got a request for further document on the 19th and received the visa on the 21st. Good service and a lot easier than farting about with the post office.

Do keep up, UK passports are now stamped, maybe you think reading and stamping can be done in the same time. As well as the queue I was a good few minutes at Vienna border control a few weeks ago as she checked through my passport, checked the connecting flights before stamping the passport. The EU citizens were virtually walking through their gates.

Rubbish, there will always be queues, only the depth will vary. People voted to queue up and have their passports stamped. When I disembarked at Vienna on my way back to Thailand a few weeks ago, had to queue up and get passport stamped, no longer able to use the fast lanes for EU passports.

About the same as before the single market came about. In the early 80s I took some medical ovens in a car to a customer in the south of France, paperwork at Dover was a nightmare. Small business did not want to deal with Europe then and the same will happen. England voted to put back border controls and now they want to complain about it.

Quite meaningless. From 22 April 2013 it was about 3 and a half years before the rate was near 44 again. Tell us what the average rate of exchange was between 22 April 2013 and the brexit vote. Then tell us what the average rate of exchange was between the brexit vote and today. Of course you are perfectly free to believe they are the same, doesn't make it fact.

You asked to see what "pounds" are.

Garbage.

GBP

Yes. I have my visa to return and I haven't left for the UK yet, next week. As said I also did Non O marriage. On the third page, they ask for the arrival date and a flight number, then an intended departure date. There is nowhere on the supporting documents that asks for flight details to be uploaded. List attached The website is common and emails will come from @mfa.go.th, any response you make will go to the US embassy address. Having paid the fee you have obviously submitted an application, have you checked the current status? Official Website of Thailand Electronic Visa_4.pdf

You can get it done free in the UK but you have to be nearly blind and the waiting list is somewhere in the order of 2 years. It is coming up to 3 years since I had my first one done, the second a couple of months later. One of the best decisions ever. I had mine done at Ban Phaeo and was also about 20K/eye.

Further to my previous post, if you did actually create an application on this website you can return to the website, sign in and see the status at any time. You should also check your junk folder, a response from the embassy may have gone there. Even if it is incomplete it will remain on the system for 14 days. You can edit the information, other than the first page up, until the application is submitted. If you need to change the first page you would have to create a new application and remove the original.

It is my understanding that the US is on the E-visa platform and you would be right in what you say. From 18 February 2021, visa applicants in the United States are required to apply online through the website https://www.thaievisa.go.th/. For instructions on the Thailand e-visa, please check the User Manual or watch the Video User Manual. https://thaiembdc.org/visas/ That being the case the questions would be have you opened the latest version of the website and not one from your cache, and then did you follow the instructions. It is a stickerless system and you do not need to send passport away. You need to create an account, select the required visa and answer the questions. They will come back to you if there is any query on the docs. You have to complete all the questions one way or another and there is a bit of farting about doing a selfie with passport. You need to submit the application and then you can check the status of the application at any time. On the website the first thing you will see is this statement. Attention : From 1 July 2022, proof of quarantine hotel/hospital booking is no longer required. Health insurance(s) are required only for Special Tourist Visa (STV), and Long-Stay Visas (Non-Immigration OA and OX) applications. I have just got a Non O marriage from the UK using the same website, the only difference is your application will be directed to the US embassy rather than London and any queries on the documents will come from them. I didn't have much problem with the application, it asked for a flight number to BKK but only an intended return date. I just put a date 90 days forward as I also intend to get extension. I wasn't asked for flight details. The guidance says all documents should be in English so I sent translated marriage certificate, within 24 hours they asked for the Thai version and I still received the visa in 3 days.

At this point in time you are probably right, but I did have something else in mind. In 2019 I ended up in a legal battle with BA over compensation. I was on a flight from BKK to Manchester that came in too late for the last flight to Manchester and I ended up being 18 hours late into Manchester. BA blamed the weather at BKK for a delay of 20 minutes out of BKK but there was more to it than that. Between the time I bought my ticket and the time of the flight, BA had to adjust the route which increased the flight time both ways by over an hour. Passengers were never informed and they just tried to turn the aircraft round in a reduced time. If BA are still faced with the extended route times they may see the route as potentially problematic.

The current problems at Heathrow are open ended and would have forced BA to make a statement, an extension being the obvious outcome. As BA are currently selling tickets from London to Bangkok on 2 different routes, via Doha or Hong Kong, they are not going to be in a hurry to bring back the direct flights. The previous arrangement was based on an aircraft going from LHR to BKK and back in 24 hours, something that may now have problems, only open to speculation.

That would have been when the government changed the rules on contracting out of SERPS. Many tend to forget that their personal pension was partially funded by the government. At that point in time returns from pensions funds were much higher than recently putting a smile on the face of many when they did get it. At my age I should have responded a bit quicker and effectively missed the boat. Until 1988, people could only contract out if they were members of a defined benefit (DB) occupational pension scheme. In 1988, the government extended this to defined contribution (DC) or money purchase occupational schemes and personal pensions. For the first five years of the scheme, the government paid an extra 2% of your earnings into your personal pension. By 1992, more than 5 million people had left Serps for a personal pension. https://www.which.co.uk/money/pensions-and-retirement/state-pension/what-was-contracting-out-a581c3l1kqf4

Yes indeed. A friend of mine was made redundant when he was about 50. He had done over the 30 years and started paying voluntary contributions towards the 44 years. Some years later when they dropped it to 30 years he asked for the voluntary contributions back, no chance.

Under the old system you paid NI in 2 parts, the second part being your contribution to an increased pension, the more you earned the more you paid in, and this payment was then added to your basic pension. If you contracted out, you didn't stop paying the second part, it was redirected into your occupational pension or in later years a private pension. I was mid 40s when they changed the law to allow individuals to contract out and the advice at the time was to remain with SERPS. When they brought in the new pension I am not sure what happened with the additional NI, I suspect it was absorbed into NI without anything being said.

Yes, but the media made a meal out of it. I saw the Emirates CEO on the news and rhetoric wasn't quite as confrontational. His view was they would work something out to avoid cancellations but dodged the question on ticket sales..