tabarin

As I read previously that appointments are now required I started to Google and ended up on the appointment website.
I registered my account and wanted to make my appointment for next week after logging in.

I had to find out that for both Tourist visa and Non immigrant visa there is no time slot available until March 19th, which is not working for me at all.
I will go to Savannakhet instead but I just wanted to give everyone a heads up to make the appointment way ahead in time. 

Really sucks as I liked to do my Vientiane visits and know people there but planning that far ahead doesn't always work out for me. So I am out of there now too.

Hope Savannakhet will not change as Cambodia is not really an option (not liked, nonsense at borders, unfriendly DMK airport)
and Kuala Lumpur asking more paperwork / ticket out I never use etc.

On 2/8/2019 at 8:16 AM, Longcut said:

What if you plan on leaving Thailand in a year after your next extension. How is one to draw down their 800K over the year? It is almost impossible to transfer funds out of Thailand unless you use a service like DeeMoney.com. Will there be a penalty if one gets caught living on the 800K? If I were leaving, I would not want to be bringing more money into the country when I already have 800K in the bank. At one point possibly midyear, I would be dipping below the 400K baht threshold. How is someone suppose to draw down their funds before leaving?

This is really easy, first you can reserve the max cash allowance of around 10k USD to fly with, then a few K in gold coins. The remaining you spend in Pattaya.

Trust me, this would be the least of your worries, let me ask you a theoretical question you do not have to answer:
If you earn 300$ per month working 6 days per week, 10 hours per day in a hotel and you can get 100 baht per passport copy, what would you do?

Long story short, aside of the example above, your passport copy (and more) is available dozens of times on the deep web markets.
The good news? Rules have been changed in a positive way at most companies / banks etc already (and will be soon at others),
you have to take a selfie with your passport as well have multiple angle pictures to do anything significant making it much harder (not impossible).

Fast forward future: Passports are no longer needed, facial recognition plus fingerprint or iris scan verifications everywhere (detailled trials started at Amsterdam Airport already and Iris scan fast track immigration since years active). 

My wife does but as a foreigner it would require a WP / staff in case of psychical products etc.
Would say as a foreigner it is more interesting to focus on existing platforms in western countries with higher consuming power.

Just came across this on Facebook, a good laugh:

5 minutes ago, snowgard said:

If I am the owner of the bike I would report you to the police that you STOLE IT!!! You rent it and don't brought it back. No more to say!!!

If you rent a bike YOU have to bring it back. No one other. They don't know where the bike is. The police not would contact and inform they because they park it at a private place what charge  daily for parking.

 

And who would pay all costs what they have now (fine, parking, phone, staff, lost income, ...) because you don't brought it back? 

In my eyes you are a real bad ass and I would do everything for teach you a very good and hard lesson.

LOL you are over reacting big time aren't you? The owner most likely got it back that same day as he knew it was at the police and paid 500B fine while 1000B is deposited. So he did not lose rental income neither have other costs. He profited 1-2 day more rental income with the remaining 500B + SangSom time.

But I agree, really sloppy from the renter.

Call him and start with ''Hello, it is with Mr X. I just called the police and was happy to hear you got the motorbike back. I am sorry for the trouble but I had to catch a flight. So is everything OK now?''. Fair chance that ends well, he assumes you know the bike is back and otherwise hang up and take your chances to come anyway.

The average rental bikes are worth like 20,000 baht max. (islands even less as without license and papers) / Most certainly if you only deposited 1000 baht and not your passport as well. So that and 10,000 baht more for the police in the worst case as a reserve I guess.

2 hours ago, elviajero said:

 If the OP is the owner they can be fined for not reporting.

 

Owner should be fined but in reality you encounter this when wanting to extend your visa. You then have the option to get the landlord there in real time or pay it yourself to be able and continue with the extension application. Bit lame as it is a choice without choice 99/100 times. But when owning you are the same person so not relevant then. I never been asked for it in Bangkok neither Chiang Mai until recently and paid the fine myself.

7 minutes ago, Gweiloman said:

Technically it’s fraudulent as it’s not income but rather just rolling his money. 

Another point is that TI requires the minimum sum of 65k per month so doing quarterly transfers are not acceptable 

You are not reading to understand. First of all it is income LEGALLY even if you roll that money. It is about how you roll money and how you pay out.
Second, the quarterly transfers ARE possible. You DO transfer monthly to TH as usual but you do not have to transfer back every month when you have more than 1 month difference saved up, which is plausible to expect and otherwise you can still do it but lose a bit more on fees.

Thailand nor any country can do S**T about this as long you set it up the right way.

13 minutes ago, elviajero said:

Sending an extra 20K baht could increase the transfer costs.

 

800 baht is about £20. That’s £240 a year, meaning you need £740, not £500! That’s £1,480 over 2 years £2,220 over 3 years etc.

 

It may be legal, but the application would be fraudulent because you’re claiming to have an income that you do not have.

It is a rough indication and again, it could just as good be less than 400 baht with no charges on the first X thousand pound yearly when using a few digital accounts and banks.

There is nothing fraudulent about it depending on how you organise your financial life and setup, if you pay yourself out from a LTD company it is income legally regardless what you do with it afterwards or how that LTD get its funds. If you play everything by the rules you always lose.

The original poster and video gives a shitty example as well as most people struggle with the 400-800k baht and not with let's say a few months of the difference. That would make it less than a few transfers pear year (back to UK or wherever). 

Also any other solution with tourist visa's etc. would end up more expensive than this.

Could even do it with crypto and auto-selling it to fiat right after the 1st confirmation. If I buy BTC in Thailand and exchange that back to FIAT on a foreign account right now I will be spending less than 5$ even if it is 500k baht and takes me less than a working day to have it in a real bank again.

1 minute ago, Yellowtail said:

Dude, any way you slice it, it's still 48% a year. 

I guess you have some obsession with percentages and can't think outside the box. 
Also you are taking the maximum of costs while it would be more likely to be 600 baht, which is only the case if you do it EACH month while with 3x the difference in savings it would be only quarterly. Try taking off 2% a year on inflation of the 400-800k baht instead and the lost revenue on investments that could be 7-10% a year if you are so obsessed with percentages.

The point of this solution is that you can have a yearly visa while spending no more than 20-30USD monthly of your entire pension to make it work.

Just now, Yellowtail said:

800/20,000 = 4% per month, or 48% a year of 25 months to burn through your 20,000.

 

You go ahead

Dude, do you have your head sticked in the sand or something? Obviously you PAY the fees with your BUDGET and not from your LIMITED MONEY.

5 minutes ago, Gweiloman said:

Aren’t transfer charges normally a percentage of the amount of funds to be transferred?

That depends where / with who or how you transfer your money. I know 3-4 digital banks with EU/GBP money alone that would allow you to do a few thousand euro per year for free entirely and that is without making a proper plan or dealing with big banks. Be creative and do your homework, it is so easy.

10 minutes ago, elviajero said:

The £500 is soon going to disappear in charges. So you need £500 PLUS the cost of sending the money back and forth.

Nonsense, if you do this in a smart way it might cost you 500-800 baht a month in fees only as the incoming transfer fees have to be paid regardless.
Tons of ways to even make it more legal / official with some LTD setup abroad.

Obviously you could make it even more efficient when you have more cashflow than the 1 month difference. You could then only send back every X months.

4 minutes ago, brokenbone said:

can i stay in vietnam continuously without leaving the country for any sort of visa run ?

what visa is that ?

can you name a couple of places at the sea where electric just works all year round ?

also wonder if they give permanent residency by chance ? i'm getting disenchanted by being held at ransom by immigration officers.

thank you in advance

Do your research on places to live but the standard way is to get a Business visa for 350-400$ a year and obviously you do not have to leave anymore, no reporting too. You can even do any business and work and finish the day with a real steak and a bottle of good red wine for 11$ in a restaurant.

2 minutes ago, moe666 said:

What finicial requirements, they are still the same as they have been for over 10 yers. The only thing to change is the way your money is deposited in a bank for income method. The holding period for 800,000k in the bank has changed. It would have been interesting to have seen the moaning and groaning if the amouts had been changed to say one million bhat.

That is not realistic to say at all, you know just as well that things did not work like that until after the coup and many paid a yearly fee to the agent to take care of it, financial proof was never really required that way.

Does that mean the rules always been the same and are merely being enforced now? Yes. Does that make it right, strategic and fair or smart? No.

16 minutes ago, moe666 said:

No stress here the stress seems to only come from people on TV who cannot qualify for the money because they never had any money.

There should be a new poll how many have bought tickets to leave mean old Thailand because Thailand has decided to protect there immigration process better.

Only? You are talking about 50% of the results with significant stress levels over this. Think that are quite a few then. Protecting the process also got nothing to do with these absurd financial requirements and retirees are generally not the people who cause trouble either.

Also I find a pension from 1250 euro really reasonable but that would only give you 45,000 baht today. Even with 1500 it is still under 55k.

In Holland people have their money locked up even they build up a decent pension, if they want to cash that out at once fines of up to 50% take place. This is often also a reason why people are limited even they are indirectly well off. Add on to that that many of those did have some cash savings but bought a house or condo with that in the nice years.

1 minute ago, brokenbone said:

vietnam would only ever be an option if i never have to cross border once i'm there.

also wonder how their electric holds up,

i'm done with power-out

Not sure what you are saying, power is generally fine unless you live in a bad place. Visa wise it is like 350-400$ per year and you can re-enter as many times you want?

11 minutes ago, granuaile said:

Just for the record, I don't blame Thailand or Thai immigration. It was the actions of four western embassies that sparked all of this, Immigration here just adapted to that. I do wish they would accept original watermarked documents, but que sera sera. Thailand has been very good to me, I love living here, and I feel guilty at leaving my friends, even leaving my apartment building and the people in it and in my soi.

You have all the right to blame Thai immigration, at the end they decide what to do and not to do. It is complete nonsense if it comes down to the financial requirements Thailand asks, you need less in European countries. You would even qualify for a long term visa in Holland with the amounts they ask today.

I don't understand retirees in this position though, you can have a hassle free live in Vietnam with 2-3x cheaper beers and still visit Thailand.

There are even direct flights to Da Nang and such, I would just spend 2x 3 months per year there and elsewhere if not moving permanently.

That are some pretty bad poll results if you ask me, losing just 30% of expats and retirees more at this stage would be bad.

Having been here 5-6 years and still being under 30 it is pretty much getting too much hassle. If it wouldn't be for having a son now (which basically gives me a visa until retirement age), I would have left Thailand for Vietnam or elsewhere already. 

Have to conclude that the EX rates are bad, prices locally inflated a lot, girls are asking much more in the (in)famous nightlife and all the raids and visa crap + costs. 

Also rarely see people that are left from the moment I came here as a new expat generation / online worker. Mostly new people or the ones that are here for around 2 years now and then eventually go home or elsewhere again.

Doesn't always got everything to do with a visa though, most of them simply can't sustain and grow their business here.
Last but not least, the new generation often just goes to a visa agent and doesn't bother being on an old school forum.

No (but they could, chances are low so only book a bogus ticket or greenbus ticket if they request it at the counter).

Just now, ubonjoe said:

It is 2 visa exempt entries per calendar year (January 1st to December 31st). If you have a visa for entry there is no limit.

You get a new permit to stay not an extension when you enter the country. Extensions are only done at a immigration office.

Thanks it should be fine then to go! I meant the 30 day on arrival at Mae Sai and not extension. 

I was wondering if the 2 times landborder per year crossing is counted in calendar years? I am considering doing a Mae Sai extension end of January.