Hi,
Thank you for all of your input. I have decided to go and do a land border crossing in two weeks.
To confirm, the situation. One lawyer told me recently:
"The immigration office has informed us that your name is not listed on the list of people prohibited from entering Thailand."
Incident was 12 years ago.
Within the first year of the incident, I was on a trip with Thai Airways from Malaysia to Vietnam that transited in BKK. Whilst in transit, I tried to get through immigration for a couple of hours and they stopped me, but let me go into the business lounge to wait for my connection as I already hard the boarding pass for the onward flight (i.e. I wasn't deported).
Two years later I had a similar trip to Hanoi with a transit in BKK. First flight was with Thai Airlines and the connection was with Vietnam Airlines from BKK to Hanoi. When I checked in for the first flight I got a "DNB" but after a lot of discussion they let me board because of my connection through to Hanoi.
So, certainly 10 years ago I was on a "list".
1. Is it possible that immigration perhaps migrated within the last 10 years to a new system and my blacklist hasn't been carried across? This would explain the lawyer getting a response form an immigration officer that I am not on any list at this time?
2. I am going to make the land border crossing anyway as I need to know. I have researched the various land crossings from Malaysia and Cambodia - is there any border crossing that you would advise that may make this easier?
Thanks