Thaindrew

they have this system in Hong Kong and it works well, they do still give you a boarding pass as well.

He would also have been shocked at the baggage fee

I have only read the UK DTA but the word "assessable" (assessable or non-assessable) is not found in the document once, it only states what can be "taxed" and by which country, the DTA is one way of claiming funds that are assessed should not be taxed, Thai RD data only comes from CRS, it tells them your remittances, it doesn't say which remittances are accessible or not (CRS doesn't know the detail of the funds behind every remittance, it knows income and remittance values), that will be the point of the tax return and any follow up that Thai RD conduct.

all are "assessable", part of the assessment is if the funds fall under a DTA, if they do they are not "taxable"

There are 2 steps - firstly any and all remittance into Thailand are assessable for tax but second, if you can show that the source of funds remitted fall outside the scope of the Thai tax system there is no tax to be paid one area that is being interpreted different ways is in the example of when you remit funds to another person / company. Say you want to buy a condo for 5m baht, you remit to a lawyer or the developer, its still a remittance by you and so with a "remittance tax" its assessable (its not a "received by you" tax system). Property agents are though instructing people that such remittances are not taxable (which they would say to retain business), if such remittance are assessable this could have a major impact on people if they cannot prove that such funds are from a. source that fulls outside the Thai tax system. This seems to already be affecting property sales as people wait to see.

remittances are part of the CRS data the TRD gets from every bank that has your Thai address listed, this is already happening.

If you only need long distance correction you should be able to have LASIK treatment and improve your all round vision

and if you use an agent who puts that 800k into you account for the visa application, what then? Thailand considers all deposits as potential income .....

thats true and very good level of allowance for may retirees, however your figure does assume your wife is not working or has no obligation to file a tax return and so use her own allowance rather than allocate it to you. Then there may be a small tax bill based just on the UK state pension.

its all linked to your tax id number, its almost impossible to open a bank account without providing one.

The proposal here is worse than in China, expats dont pay tax for the first 5 years in China and can re start that 5 years by leaving for 3 months

it is not clear that the DTV will be tax free if you are here over 180days, with the proposed global tax method requiring new legislation the DTV and indeed the LTR visas will not be auto-exempt, they are only exempt under the current legislation

there's various ways to not be obligated to pay tax currently, I work for a Hong Kong company but don't live there, so the income is zero rated for tax. I live in Thailand and currently don't need to remit funds as I sent sufficient last year - so no remittances this year, so not tax in Thailand this year. Of course these new proposed changes for 2025 could change all that .....

It’s not illegal yes, issue is becoming more with banks insisting you put some country as a residence ideally with a tax code under threat of closing your accounts

Whilst that’s correct, you have to declare somewhere as tax residency right? Cannot just leave it blank?