Thailand Outcast

"Had a great holiday there in Vietnam to boot' - yes, and can you imagine living there, without all the visa BS here?  ????

As BritTim says, I think you should be ok.  How old is your passport?  If it's near the end of its life, full of exemption stamps and visas, it might be a good idea to get a new one. 

I say this to cover for the lazy immigration officer who couldn't be bothered to do the maths on your entry history, and just sees all the entries and then starts to cause a problem for you, and when that starts, it's all about "face" and then there is very little you can do.  

5 minutes ago, rabas said:

"It's under your control...."  If you've lived here 35 years, all your investments are here, have a 3 generation family that depends on you, which you helped bring up, all your friends here, ...

 

... then to say it's under your control you can always remove it,  is technically correct the same way as parachuting school teaching, if something goes wrong on the way down, don't panic, you have the rest of your life to fix it. 

Or, your reserve chute is Vietnam, Bali, Philippines etc, and everyone needs a reserve chute.    ????

2 minutes ago, Pattaya46 said:

You can get more than 2%, and it's more that what is offered by many western banks...

 

And for the new expats, if they don't like this method (800k) to stay, at least 3 other methods have been given in this thread. Hard to think that none of these 3 can be easy for them.

2% is way under the 6% to 8% I am currently getting on my money, with minimal risk.

Anyway, for me, it's agents in the future, or leave, but no way I will have my finances manipulated.  

Thai authorities seem to think there are no other alternatives to Thailand in the region, but there is, and they are looking better by the day.

13 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

You can touch it all you want.  You can take it out.  You can leave it in.  Up to you.  There are many ways to live in Thailand.  One method is income another is a 2 year Visa from your home country with no money in Thai banks.  If you choose the 800/400k method you must leave the money in the bank but at all times it is under your control.  The variable is the visa/extension. 

"The variable is the visa/extension." - No.  The variable is the punishment for using your own money.  

The 800k / 400k for next year's visa is akin to "can you send 800k for sick buffalo."  ????

1 minute ago, Jingthing said:

No. You are severely restricted from touching it if you want to use it for the bank method. That's what the point is. People using the bank method. 

Yes, and not to mention the lousy 1.5% return you get to be able to get next year's visa. 

Now, it's ok for those already embedded here, but a lousy deal like this is hardly going to to attract new expats to Thailand in the future. 

4 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

Exactly. This is onerous. This is highly unusual compared to any other international retirement visa program. Of course your money is locked up and if you do go under presumably to prepare to leave Thailand, you instantly put yourself into questionable legal status. Really, many of us are kind of stuck here more or less for various reasons, but these changes should put all prospective future expats on high alert. 

When you look at it, objectively, they say the deposit of this money is to ensure you can support yourself, but you can't use it to support yourself this year, otherwise, you don't get a visa for next year.  So, it's not money you can use at all, really.  ????

It's just a cheap loan to Thai banks. 

1 hour ago, marcusarelus said:

Bin the control talk.  Everyone knows you don't lose control of your money.  If you don't want to stay take your money and leave.  No loss of control. 

If you don't lose control of your money, how about you explain how you can't touch 800k of your own money for 5 months, and 400k of your own money for 12 months, which is, basically, perpetually, equals no loss of control.  ????

3 hours ago, Joe Mcseismic said:

I would take a guess that if you go below the stipulated periods for keeping the 800k and the 400k, you won't get another extension because you have broken immigration law.

I'm sure they will invent a "fee" for going under the 400k.  Yet another money spinner, and farang are easy targets.  Money number one here.

1 hour ago, Chodi25 said:

Actually even if you have a 1 year visa in Vietnam you still have to do a boarder run every 90 days. I know, it makes no sense but that is the system they have. They also give preference to Americans for 1 year visa. Go figure that. Those Americans still have to do the 90 day border runs. Crazy system.

Not true.

If you have a 1 year Vietnam visa, no boarder runs every 3 months.  Only a boarder run at the end of the 12 months, to get another 12 months. 

10 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

All good things must come to an end.  The day of this being the land of smiles is over.  I'm glad I got to experience it for a while at least, but I think it's time to start thinking about another place that has a little more respect for ExPats...and the long-term money they bring to an economy...like maybe Vietnam.

I don't expect Thai's to respect me, but what I do expect, from a country marketing itself as a retirement destination, is some certainty and surety in their visa system that legally permits expats to reside here, but we can't have foreigners actually having any rights, can we?

Seriously, out of the retired demographic, what is the percentage of foreigners committing crime, or destitute? 

All this 800k / 400k is a smoke screen for cheap farang loans to Thai banks.  

It can't be call emergency funds for an accident or illness because if you spend some of your 800k in pre or post seasoning, no visa, and is you spend some of your 400k at all, no visa. 

Vietnam is pay a flat fee and here is your visas.  No hoops to jump through. 

1 hour ago, smedly said:

just make it 400k all year round for all extensions and the whole thing is simplified and compensated for the very strong baht

It already is 400k all year round, plus another 400k for 5 months. 

So, you only get to use 400k of your money for a 7 month window period. 

1 hour ago, Skallywag said:

Just keep 800,000 baht in your Thai bank account always and you will get your annual retirement extension - no confusion, no stress

I'll happily leave before I lose control over 800k baht of my money.

I'll see how it plays out with the agents, and if they can't get around it, I'm off to Vietnam, and will come back frequently on tourist visas.   

A few posts discussing how to identify a deceased foreigner.

Information on another thread is fingerprinting at the airports will be implemented soon.  Obviously, the land boarders should have them as well, if they were serious about it, but even the airport fingerprinting will make it easier for police to identify foreigners in the future, dead, or alive. 

7 hours ago, mngmn said:

Absolutely. Read the procedure while waiting for IO to stamp me out.

Are they still doing the facial recognition as well, or does the fingerprinting do away with that?

Are you sure about the four fingers?

Cambodia and Malaysia require only the two index fingers to be scanned. 

4 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

 

 

Good idea. That's what happens at the airport

For all we know, they have a quota each day of rejections they must meet, despite all applicants meeting the requirements.  Who knows?

1 hour ago, smedly said:

does your face need to be in it ?        

 

you have to laugh at these people in jobs of importance were they very obviously shouldn't be, just look at the road carnage and the people that are supposed to be in charge of that.

 

The private sector in Thailand works very well because it is run by foreign companies

 

The public sector is home run, Thais run it, I won't expand any further - nothing more needs to be added except that it fails in absolutely every way possible and then some

 

Give me an example of something that Thais run that is not a complete (deleted) up, I honesty cannot think of a single thing

The Thai's do a good job of running a prostitution industry, despite it being illegal.  ????

On 4/17/2019 at 6:23 PM, observer90210 said:

you should rather be thanking him for sharing information,  instead of making a comment that sounds rather rude. case closed.

Of course, any piece of information is better then no information, and I thank the OP for his effort, but where do you draw the line?  I did not post to be rude, just to point out how ridiculous the whole system is. 

There are now so many different experiences from people on TV, but from within in the same immigration office.  Who knows what to expect and what to prepare for?

What if someone posted in this thread that they went to the same office, on the same day, with the same paperwork, and never had a problem?  Should these threads now start physically describing individual immigration officers as the ones to stay away from?

At what point of information exchange can anyone gain ny confidence in this crazy system?

You can accept the OP's information and plan for it, then attend the same immigration office, only to be told about some other bureaucratic oversight, and so, another thread is started, and it keeps going on and on and on.

It appears we have come to the point where it doesn't matter if one has all their paperwork correct under the new laws, because immigration have no idea what the new laws are, so no one knows whether to prepared under the old laws, or new laws.

it's getting more confusing and stressful by the day. 

On 4/16/2019 at 12:19 PM, GinBoy2 said:

Well they do it because you are are a tourist on a visa extension.

 

I've said this many many times, however there is section of the expat community who seem to be in total denial, thinking of themselves as permanent residents, which is so far from the truth as to be comical.

 

They could change the rules tomorrow and make you report every 30 days, put ฿2M in the bank, it's totally arbitrary, and since you have no rights in Thailand, what are you gonna do?

You are but a long stay guest 

So all all up to the regime du jour!

Buckle Up boys

So true.

A "retirement visa" may well as be called a "1 year tourist visa" because you have the same rights on a retirement visas as a new tourists to Thailand on a 30 visa exempt, and that is, zero.

Visas are one thing, but how long before law changes creep into property ownership?  Not to mention, how many foreigners are using Thai nominees for property ownership?  

We may see the day when a foreigner who owns a property here, doesn't actually qualify for a visa to live here full time in their own property. 

1 hour ago, LongTang said:

Thanks for sharing your experience.

 

Slowly but surely Thailand is destroying its reputation as an attractive place to visit..

Not only just visit, but to retire to. 

Today's tourists, could be tomorrow's retirees.

I can't see the Chinese retiring here, so by giving farang a hard time while they are in their tourist visa phase, it's not a great advertisement for prospective retirees to Thailand. 

4 hours ago, WaveHunter said:

Is it a simple one day procedure (i.e.: fly to Vietnam, apply, and be on my way back to Thailand the next day) or is it more involved like the 6 month METV was that I got from the US before coming over here?

The Thai Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City was a 1 day turn around, and maybe still is, but given the current visa situation, you might be best to allow more time, or at least contact them and ask for their turn around times.

I haven't done a visa run to Ho Chi Minh City for a lot of years, but I have a clear memory that they require a flight out of Thailand with your application.   

Don't forget to carry 20,000 baht for your arrival.