Arkady

22 hours ago, THAIJAMES said:

Unfortunately as a PR holder with 2 more years to go, before I can apply for citizenship, the same thing will probably happen that happened after my PR application.... change of governments and 8 years of waiting until PR was approved.

Making someone wait 8 years for PR is an utter disgrace.  You must feel very frustrated waiting to apply for citizenship.  All I can say is that if Prayut gets his wish and returns as PM, he is sure to put up a fight to keep the Interior Ministry in a safe pair of hands and keep current policies going. Alternatively they might manage to delay elections even longer, which I personally wouldn't mind too much as I will be allowed to vote in 2020, not that I can see anyone worth voting for.

15 hours ago, qualtrough said:

It seems pretty universally recognized here that the current government has acted to speed up and improve the process, but does anyone know why? I can't think of any domestic pressure to do so. Is there some international influence, perhaps treaty obligations and that sort of thing? Theories?

Nothing to do with treaty obligations.  The only treaty that could possibly apply re citizenship is the Convention against Stateless to which Thailand is a signatory and flagrantly violates on a regular basis. There is little sign that this government cares any more about the hundreds of stateless minorities born on Thai soil than any of its predecessors, viz the revelations of the stateless cave boys and coach who are to all intents and purposes as Thai as the next man but denied the same rights and privileges as their neighbours for no good reasons and no benefit to the nation.

I think it was genuinely a part of their bad guys out, good guys in policy, since they have applied the same philosophy to PR applications, as well as had regular crack downs on overstayers, albeit focused on black ones, and started enforcing existing laws on overstays more seriously.  In addition I believe that Gen Anuphong was genuinely repulsed by the corruption, sloth and general condescending attitude he found at the Interior Ministry, some of it related to previous politico ministers but much of it to do with the institution itself.  He initiated an immediate reshuffle of top mandarins there and put his own people at the top. The military views the Interior Ministry as a key ministry from the point of view of national security and also that vetting people for PR and citizenship as a national security role.  So I believe that Anuphong saw these processes involving foreigners as just one of the many issues related to national security that previous governments had allowed to get mired in corruption and sloth, thus endangering the nation state.  Just my take but I believe the military mindset is something like this, even though corruption and sloth cannot be said to be totally absent from the military itself. After the 2006 coup something similar happened but on a more limited scale as the coup appointed government only stayed in power for a year and comprised many indolent retired bureaucrats rather than military men.  Even so, it should be noted that Gen Sarayud as prime minister chose to take the Interior portfolio himself and did, in fact, approve a significant number of backlogged citizenship applicants, although nothing much was done for PR applications, the process for which was totally disrupted by the Thaksin government and only just back to normal under the current government, meaning approvals within 12 months.      

1 hour ago, THAIJAMES said:

Have only the highest respect for Arkady.  I think he was only saying that in regards to citizenship issues, the current government has generally been more efficient and faster than previous governments.  Anybody that follows Thai citizenship issues would agree.

 

To infer that he would take political sides or that he sees issues in black and white disrespects the tremendous amount of help and insight that he has provided on this thread.

You are right.  I only point out political changes in so far as they affect the citizenship process.  The political shift following the 2014 coup is fact and is actually documented.  A notice was posted by the interior ministry a few months after the coup saying that citizenship had been approved for 365 people (all wives), many of whom, said the announcement, had been waiting as long as 7 years and the ministry wanted to give them certainty about their status and conclude the process for them.  The announcement published the names informally by after the minister had signed but they had not yet been gazetted (no need for royal approval or the oath for wives) with a warning that they should not pay money to anyone who claimed to be able to expedite the process (obviously knowing that many dishonest lawyers and brokers are tipped off by officials before the RG announcement and claim to their clients there is suddenly a chance to get the minister to sign a batch if they pay B200k, which they share with the corrupt official that tipped them off.  This was a quite extraordinary change in the process and clearly indicated that a new broom was in charge and that things were going to be faster and more transparent (good guys in bad guys out).  MoI staff confirmed at the time that the minister had ordered them to speed things up and try to adhere to a specific timeline, rather than just hiding behind the "minister's discretion" and blaming him, as in the past (often with some justification).   At the same time as approving the wives, the minister signed off on the backlog of male applicants but there was no announcement because they had to be forwarded to the Palace at that stage.  He signed off on a batch of applicants who had already received royal approval and made the oath but were in limbo in months because no one would sign for them to go into the RG during the political turmoil.  One of those was myself. 

I have not commented that coups are a good thing or given an overall view of the current government but it has certainly been good for citizenship (and PR) applications.  This can't go on for ever.  So hurry while stocks last! 

1 hour ago, Neeranam said:

Does anyone know if there is a MOI interview day every month, or every three months, and how many applicants are seen in one day.

I heard it was about 50, is this right?

 I was also told that there was a backlog of 300, so trying too estimate a time, as it's important for my career.

AFAIK they aim to hold them monthly but getting all 15 committee members from various departments (7 I think being from parts of the MoI), as prescribed in the Nationality Act is not feasible on a monthly basis.  I would guess they hold interviews 10 times in a good year and less in bad years.  Under the previous political governments they got rather slack at holding them and I think it drifted to around every other month but Gen Anuphong lit a fire under them and told them to set timelines which has speeded things up.   I am not sure how applicants they are including at present.  They tend to vary the format.  Some years ago they tried interviewing several applicants simultaneously at different tables but that presumably didn't work out.  At one point they decided to interview only in the mornings but I think they interviewing all day now. 

An office topic post and response were deleted.

6 hours ago, greenchair said:

I used to pop out to the moi and say hi every now and then. 

I would just ask them about my case and let them put a face to the pile of documents. They would always tell me what the hold up was. Such as I had an impending court case.

I don't know if it helped but I got the letter for an interview a couple of weeks after my curtasy call. If your thai is not too bad, then pop in for a chat. 

P.S. , don't even think about getting anywhere on the telephone. 

P.S.S dress nicely and be super polite. 

Visiting the MoI doesn’t do any harm and is sometimes necessary, if there is an obvious spanner in the works or a lengthy delay. A visit there in which I was lucky enough to get to see the head of the section definitely saved my application, which SB had  incompetently botched, and I was called for interview quickly after the error was corrected. It also made a subsequent visit and my interview easier because I already knew her. Hopefully, it is less necessary to go out there under the current regime, while applications are tending to take around three years, compared to up to a decade or more in the recent past. But putting a face to your file can’t hurt as long as you polite and well dressed like Greenchair.

15 minutes ago, qualtrough said:

It's been just 3 weeks since my NIA interview, but I am wondering if you or anyone else can provide advice on follow-up, such as how long I should wait before contacting my NIA guy,  what to specifically ask, etc. I don't want to annoy him, but on the other hand I want to be sure there are any problems or my file hasn't been misplaced, that kind of thing. If anyone has advice on how their interim NIA-MOI period experience went I would appreciate it.

 

One more thing: what is the cover letter known as in written Thai?

No need to contact the NIA after they have interviewed you. Just follow up with SB. It's likely to take 1-3 months before they forward your file to the MoI, depending on how quickly the other agencies reply.  Nowadays they seem to be batching up applicants to forward to the MoI which might make it take more time. I think I followed up three months after the NIA interview, only to find that they had forwarded my file one month after the interview but kept quiet about it.  I would suggest that following up with SB 3-4 months after the NIA interview would be appropriate but I don't think they mind people following up.  Remember there are a lot of Chinese and Indian applicants that use agents who are usually very aggressive Thai Chinese or Thai Indian types that you will come across in the SB office, if you go there often enought.  So SB must get badgered by them  all the time.  A polite farang on the phone or on LINE is unlikely to bother them. 

Maybe someone else can chip in the precise term for a covering letter.  I just asked if the file had been forwarded to the MoI and the officer responded with a copy of the letter.

On the dual citizenship issue there are posts in other threads where look krung (half-Thais) living abroad had entered Thailand on a foreign passport and then sorted out a Thai passport while in the country, which they tried to use to leave Thailand after overstaying on the foreign passport.  On more than one occasion Thai Immigration was able to make the match with the foreign passport used for entry, despite them having completely different names in their Thai passports, and forced them to pay the overstay fines on the grounds that they had chosen to enter as foreigners and had to close the loop with their foreign passports.  (This is a position one could probably argue in court but when you've got a plane to catch, it's easier just to pay up and go.)  On the other hand, others have posted they left the country on a new Thai passport with a different name from the foreign passport they entered on and were not picked up for overstaying. I think it is very likely that Immigration would be able to detect a blacklisted person using another person, if they can pick up overstayers with different names like this.  With the same name in both passports, I would guess the chance of a black listed person being detected would be excess of 90%.

Luckily for Mr Tim he has at least a 50% chance of his prediction being correct.

On 7/22/2018 at 1:50 PM, GabbaGabbaHey said:

9 months since NIA. Application also sent to MOI in March. No letter received so far.

As Yankee99 points out SB seems to be batching up the applications now and sending them to the MoI with a brief group covering letter, rather than a detailed covering letter for each application, as in the past.  Whatever the format, you need to try to get a copy of the covering letter from SB.  My experience in following up my application with the MoI was that they always asked for the date of the covering letter as a reference and wanted to see the copy when I went there in person. Things seem to be running a lot more smoothly under the current government, so hopefully you will never need to follow up with the MoI.  However, things could revert back again and it is best to be prepared anyway.

This seems consistent with the president of the US is saying about undesirablity of a free press and it would a US journalist and media organization.

3 hours ago, scorecard said:

Thanks, point taken, actually I will apply and I will do it in Bangkok.

 

From my understanding the Special Branch is located with the police headquarters complex on Rama 1, opposite Central World. 

 

I googled for the initial form with no success, is the application form on-line?

 

Correct. You go down Henri Dunant Road and go in the last entrance to National Police HQ before the Police Nursing College. Pass the display of SB motor cycles. Pass the criminal records office in your right and the next one is the SB nationality section on the ground floor, Building 24, if I remember rightly. The application form is usually on the SB website along with a lot of other information in Thai only but you don’t need the form. SB will fill it out for you when you have satisfied all the requirements.

8 hours ago, scorecard said:

 

In my own case I live permenantly, in the North

Re your enquiry about citizenship, people have successfully applied in Chiang Mai but I doubt, if any of the other Northern provinces would be able and willing to handle an application.  The Act requires applicants in the provinces to apply to Special Branch in their province, probably for the ostensible convenience of applicants and the ease of local SB checking their backgrounds. The problem is that it is a complex process and it would be a lot of work for a provincial SB HQ to figure out how to do it for a one-off case. They would need to make many calls to the responsible Interior Ministry department at Lamlukka who tend to be contemptuous of the police and may be uncooperative. Most provincial SB HQs will either flatly refuse to process a citizenship application, deny it’s their job or agree to do it but just give you the run around  until you give up or try to process it as best they can but mess it up. Typically applicants in provinces other than CM, Chonburi and Phuket end up having to get on to a friend’s tabien Baan in Bangkok for a few years in order to apply successfully, which involves a number of trips to Bangkok. For some, particularly those without PR, all this may be worth the trouble. For others happy with PR, it might not be. I applied after 14 years of PR and it was worth it for me, as I wanted to be able to own land in my own name among other things and, fortunately, I live in Bangkok.

8 hours ago, scorecard said:

 

Thanks for that, interesting to know. In my own case I live permenantly, in the North with my adult Thai son and his Thai wife and kids. I have no family whatever or home nowadays in my original country. Thailand is home in every respect and I've always been careful to get a multiple exit/re-entry stamp in my passport and PR book every 12 months and get the red police book updated well before the due date. So far so good. Thanks again.

 

 

 

If you don’t plan to travel abroad and don’t foresee a need to make any emergency trips overseas, you can just let your re-entry permit and residence book endorsement lapse and only do it, if you decide to travel abroad. Letting them lapse is only a problem, if it happens while you are outside the Kingdom.

8 hours ago, THAIJAMES said:

 

Thank you.  I will try my best to keep my PR ?

A friend of mine actually lost his PR as he had to have emergency surgery performed while on an overseas trip and couldn't make it back before his endorsement expired.  No amount of appeals with medical certificates could save him because it is mandated in the Immigration Act and no one has discretion not to cancel it under any circumstances.  Immigration were hugely apologetic about the cancellation but did help him reapply and fast tracked his application, so he got it back within a year.  However, that was in the days when 12 months was par for the course for all PR applicants.  I have heard of someone getting his PR in 10 months last year but it is still better to hang on to it. If there is any risk of being delayed overseas and your re-entry is running out, get it endorsed early before you travel.

55 minutes ago, scorecard said:

 

Thank you, just a couple more question if you don't mind.

 

Does holding PR strongly improve your chances of gaining approval, or just help a little bit?

 

I saw a thread years back which had some details of a points system, from memory it mentioned that, as people get older it somehow reduces your overall points total to a situation where approval becomes difficult to impossible. I'm 73 years old.  

 

Is it true about the age points item, and does holding PR give some counter-balance to the age points item?

 

Look forward to your comments, when convenient.

Here is the current points allocation system introduced in 2010. PR definitely gives you an advantage over those applying solely on the basis of marriage in getting the 50 out of 100 points needed for your application to be accepted by Special Branch.  You get 5 out of 10 for being over 60 but you get 20 points for having PR for 10 years or more.  The guys without PR applying on the basis of  marriage have to scrabble around a bit to get the 50 points because they start off 20 points down, as they get zero for residence. After they amended the law in 2008 to allow males with Thai wives to apply without PR they bumped up the points for PR and eliminated the points for having a wife and kids to make it harder for them.  Because they have a waiver from the requirement for knowledge of the Thai language, they also increased the points for Thai language and introduced the Knowledge of Thailand test in Thai.  All to little avail though, as many guys,  who can only speak one or two words of Thai, applying on the basis of a Thai wife are managing to scrape through the points system, usually younger guys with incomes above the minimum. 

If you are working and earning over the minimum B80,000 for PRs without a Thai wife and speak acceptable Thai you should easily qualify. Best thing is to go to Special Branch in Bangkok with your PR docs, passport and WP and consult with them. They will probably urge you to apply on the spot, if you live in Bangkok which is their jurisdiction. Having a residence in most provinces outside Bangkok is a problem though, as there is usually no one to take your application.  Lots more info here.

Points Allocation 2010 2 EN.doc

6 hours ago, scorecard said:

 

To Arkady,

 

Interesting subject, I got PR some 20+ years ago and still hold it, I was advised by a lawyer years ago that PR had no meaning / didn't count in terms of achieving citizenship.

 

Could you please share an overall comment regarding the current situation; PR as a conduit to citizenship.

 

Further, for PR holders 5 years / 20 years, do the other 'qualifying factors' still apply or are they different. Example, more recently another lawyer in a casual conversation said that currently citizenship applicants have to hold a current work permit, in place for at least 3 years. 

 

I would very much appreciate your comments. Thanks.

 

 

The first lawyer was wrong but the second one is right.  PR is the only route to citizenship for males who are not married to Thais. You need to be able to show with tax receipts, work permit and salary confirmation letter that you are working in the Kingdom and have been doing so for at least 3 years.  It doesn't need to be the same job and you can change jobs within the 3 year qualifying period. Unlike applying for PR you need to keep your job after you have applied and during the application process, at least until you have been interviewed at the ministry but preferably until the bitter end, in case there is a change of minister and the new one recalls files for eligibility checking.  These two requirements are to satisfy the requirements in the Nationality Act that applicants for naturalisation should be resident in the Kingdom and have an occupation.  

If you have PR, you don't need a Thai wife to apply for citizenship or to be married at all but with no Thai wife, the minimum salary required during the 3 year qualifying period is B80,000 a month, as opposed to B40,000 with a  Thai wife.

2 hours ago, YetAnother said:

quite the pure thai thinking, especially from a district chief who has to deal with a lot of non-thais;

there are other channels for citizenship, some available, but in practice not quite usable, to us expats

For expats working in Thailand there is a very usable route to citizenship by naturalization. Snce 2008 those with Thai wives no longer need to get PR first or be able to speak Thai and the fee is only 5,000 baht. Those with Thai husbands don’t need to be working or have PR or be able to speak Thai.

1 hour ago, THAIJAMES said:

 

I think that if you lost your PR from exiting the country without getting a re-entry permit,  you could still apply for citizenship because the requirement is not for PR but for residence for 5 years to be shown as proof either through the red book or your name on the blue tabien baan.

 

Am I correct in assuming this?

 

You are incorrect. The Nationality Act does not define the 5 years' residence but the guidelines issued by the Interior Ministry define it as 5 years with PR. If your PR has been cancelled, you are definitely not eligible to apply for citizenship on the basis of PR. You will have to apply for PR again and have it for 5 years before applying for citizenship.  

58 minutes ago, My Thai Life said:

About applying for citizenship after receiving PR.

 

Anyone know if it's still 5 years (for a foreigner not married to a Thai)?

 

Or has it been reduced?

 

thanks

The Nationality Act requires 5 years’ residence in the Kingdom but does not define this, leaving it open to interpretation by the MoI. In the not too distant past some people managed to slip through with less than 5 years’ PR but current interpretation is that you must have 5 years’ PR. A friend went to Soecial Branch to enquire about this a few weeks ago and he was told that under the current government they are insisting on 5 years’ PR and it was not worth trying for special treatment without ministerial level connections.

9 hours ago, KevT said:

During the 3 years of the PR process, if you are employed and have a home in Thailand, are you allowed to leave the country for short-term travels (see family, to travel)? If so, would it be seen badly and affect your chances of getting PR? What is the duration that is allowed?

If you mean the 3-year qualifying period before you apply for PR, you just need to maintain continuous visas and work permits and must have been employed in the same job for at last 12 months before you apply.  No one cares if you leave the country for business or leisure during that time, as long as you remain qualified through continuous employment in Thailand with the proper documentation.  Once your application is in process, you get automatic 6 monthly extensions of stay from the PR section at CW until you either get PR or get rejected.  Again no one cares, if you leave the country during the process, as long as you keep your 6-monthly extensions current.  You can even become unemployed or retire during that time and it doesn't affect your application.  

The only except might be someone who maintained all the correct employment documentation during the 3-year qualifying period but had spent most of the time abroad.  That would lead them to suspect that the employment was fake.