ericthai

Why do you guys comment when you dont know and make <deleted> up? If he makes it to the airport the Max fine is 20K and since he overstayed more than 1 year he will be blacklisted from entering Thailand for 3 years. If he is caught on overstay before getting to the airport and his overstay is more than 1 year he will be held in Detention until he has the money for the fine and plane ticket home. Then he since he was caught the ban is increased to 10 years.

This is very sound advise. OP As for telling your family that's a hard one. I think I would just tell my family that things didn't work out and leave it at that. They dont need to know the details. Here's a good song for you

allot would come to the USA on the 30 day exemption!! No money needed, then they will overstay and never be seen again.. so who will get weeded out?? It's so easy to go to Thailand, decide today i want to go, book a flight and go. So your "tit for tat" you really want the USA to be the same?? or it's more you just want thing fixed to suit your wants?

I don't know what happened, please enlighten me!

So you think that if you pay the police more money they will stop taking bribes??? ????

That is for emergency care only.

That's only for emergency, not regular care.

What??? allot has changed, you cant get a 1 year multi entry B visa anymore, as you stated its only 90 days and you also need complete company documents, letter from minister of labor etc. Like i said it used to so simple. our company would get a letter from the company in Thailand submit to the local Thai consultant and get a 1 year multi entry B visa. No checking company documents.

Where do you get the idea that if you get PR you get free medical in the USA and the you automatically get Social security and Medicare. Medicare part B and D you still have to pay for and if you dont work enough credits prior to enrolling in Medicare (which in most cases is only available at age 65) then you have to pay for Part A too. social security if you didn't pay into it, then you dont get anything, unless you're a spouse so someone that has paid in then you can get a percentage of their SS amount.

ok, but if you had no work permit so you were still working illegally, just because everyone turned a blind eye to it doesn't change the fact. However we are talking 20 years ago so things were very very different. Immigration was relaxed, you could get a 1 year B visa with a simple letter from an employer. Go to immigration tell them you need to stay a few days longer, they would tell you to overstay. So easy back then. I'm surprised you did boarder runs, most guys I knew just used agents that would run the passports to the boarder to get it stamped.

Where do you get the work permits are unfair? I never had an issue getting a work permit.

I agree Prayuth is a joke, but Immigration is the same as it has been for the last 15 years! It's corrupt and has always been that way. Immigration was easy to deal with back prior to Taksin, but then he started the crack downs and tweaks on visas and since then it has never stopped.

Like anything else in Thailand nobody can say exactly what will happen. All depends on the police. Most police are ok and easy going (although corrupt), some have power trips and some are just ruthless. Best to make sure you are legal to drive. Driving license, insurance. Dash cams could be good or bad, it shows mostly what happens so if youre at fault..... In all my years living in Thailand I've had two accidents. Frist one I was borrowing a friends car. My fault raining on a steel bridge I couldn't stop in time. The person I hit were ok and they called their insurance company, I called my friend who called her insurance. I never spoke to the police other than when asking me to move the car. The insurance guy handled everything with the other insurance company and the police. Very easy experience. Second time was with my truck. a drunk guy hit the side of truck with his motorbike. An off duty cop stopped. The guy that hit me started saying i was at fault and I need to pay to fix his bike. The off duty cop talked to the guy that reeked of alcohol and told me that the guy had no insurance. I told him the damage to my truck was minor(ended up costing 3,000B) so I didn't care. The cop told the guy that if he didn't want to go to jail for drunk driving he should shut up and go home now and that was the end of it. Both of those examples could have gone different ways if I ran into a really corrupt cop that needs money that day or if the other person was looking for an opportunity.

I have a friend in the USA that him and his wife contracted COVID in March last year. Then late December both him and his wife contracted COVID for a second time.

you haven't dealt with the Thai govt have you?

Extensions are done in Thailand, going back to Columbia would mean they would get a new visa. Sorry to say, but I dont think anyone can answer your question here. The best thing to do is go speak to the immigration office that you will deal with. Each office will have their own ideas on how rules are applied. You might end up needing an agent.

You will find that all govt offices operate on their own interpretation of the rules. If the lady at your immigration told you that, then do it, make sure when you go back you see the same girl. If you see someone else things might change. I have heard from other guys that their immigration accepted monthly deposits, but they couldn't go below the monthly minimum deposit amount, so couldn't be an average(1 month high, 1 month low) to meet the requirement. So it's not unheard of. Hate to tell you this, there is no normal in Thailand. What it is today might be different tomorrow. Most of the time govt officials are ok, some very helpful, then you get a bad one, power hunger, greedy, corrupt to the core and that's when problems start. Don't get me wrong, I love Thailand been living in Thailand 20+ years had my ups and downs but overall best decision I ever made. Good luck to you!

Semantics...it's still corruption. I understand you dont want to look at it as corruption, but you're paying him to "waive" or overlook a requirement to issue the extension...that is corruption! I get it, it's played off as that's just the way things are and everyone knows it and accepts it and things moves on. I complained to my staff once about having to pay a fee to a govt official to get something done that day instead of 2 weeks. I was <deleted>, they just said that how it is, pay or wait. I feel bad for the low paid thais that have to deal with this, only the poor are in jail!

Before I moved to Thailand I worked for an engineering company. The project owner 99% of the time would have an agent take care of visas / work permits. The project owner didn't have time for that and no way were they going to have engineering sitting at immigration waiting on paper work.

I used the wall too. I liked the place, drop off my passport and have lunch. Man things were soo much easier and we were treated so much better back then.

no shoes and belt!

used against me how?? Please tell me what is the sentence the court gives on this crime of not having your passport with you? Deportation? Jail?

In 20+ years in Thailand I have only been asked for my passport twice (My driver license plenty of times) once was near a Cambodian boarder and when I told him I didn't have my passport with me but had my driver license he was good with that. The other time was in 2014 during the coup, I got on a bus to bangkok and at two check points army guys bordered the bus and checked ID's. I was only asked for my passort the first time, which I was leaving Thailand so actually had on me. The second check stop the army boarded the bus again but this time they just looked at me and asked the Thai guy next to me for his ID. (I figured the guy couldn't speak English that's why he didn't ask) As anything in Thailand it's hit or miss, but the realty is you're not going to jail for not having our passport on you. You might be inconvenienced and detained until you can produce your passport, but you're not going to jail over it. Now if you're illegally in Thailand it's a different story!

as usual.......where is the rest of the story??

come on you been in Thailand long enough to know that there's nothing strange about this at all. This is normal procedure. Get in trouble moved to inactive position. It's been like this for decades, nothing is going to change, too much money for the higher ups!! In public they all condemn corruption, but behind the doors they count their money.