bazzer

Glad to say my son is now home in u. k.. he did not have to pay fine, but paid 3000bht court fee, he was held in IDC for almost 5 weeks along with 116 other prisoners, the conditions were very uncomfortable but considerably clean, food was rice and cabbage, with a boiled egg at night, allowed exercise for 1hr every other day, living space was approx. 6ft x 2ft.

Thankyou to all that posted positive comments. 

Flight is booked and paid for should be landing in U.K. Thurs 9th, fingers crossed.

I have received good news, my son has been visited by Foreign office, his status is Green, and he is good to go, I have been told that he could be on a flight by this Friday or Monday, all this has come about with the help of a good friend of my son who lives in Thailand.

I will post further details as they become available. 

On ‎4‎/‎5‎/‎2019 at 9:50 AM, 007 RED said:

OP…. I’m sorry to hear that your son has caused you a parental heartache and I hope that I can give you some information which will help you.

 

In your original post you did not mention how your son came to be in Immigration custody.  This can be important as it will have a bearing on how his case will be handled.  There are two possibilities, namely:

 

Firstly: 

If your son was arrested or stopped by the police for an unrelated immigration offence, (for example a routine police check following an accident or something more serious) the police may well have asked to see his passport and discovered that he was on overstay, and hence immigration’s involvement.

 

If he has committed an unrelated immigration offence, then that matter will need to be dealt with first by the local police and Court.  Depending what the offence was, your son could be detained in the local police cells until an initial Court appearance which is normally within a week.  Depending upon the nature of the offence, it is possible also that he may be released on bail, but he will have to surrender his passport to the Court and stay at a specified address and report to police on a regular basis until the case is formally heard.

For your information, it can take several weeks before an offence is normally tried in Court.

 

The Court will also be informed of his overstay and that matter may also be dealt with by the Court at the same time as any other offence.

 

For your information, although the fine for overstay is set at 500 THB (approximately £12) per day, the maximum fine that can be levied is 20,000 THB (approximately £494).  The Courts, however, generally reduce the overstay fine to around 3,000 to 6,000 THB.

 

Once the offence matter has been dealt with by the Court, and your son has paid any fines (or served any prison sentence) imposed by the Court, Immigration will detain your son and transfer him to the Immigration Detention Centre (IDC) in Bangkok to await deportation.  This transfer may take several days to arrange during which time he will be detained in a local police cell, or local Immigration facility.

 

Secondly:  

 

If your son was stopped by Immigration in a ‘spot check’, and they discovered that he was on four years overstay, they (Immigration) have the power to detain and deport him from the Kingdom without the need for any Court appearance.  Immigration can also charge him the maximum fine for overstay (20,000 THB) and this will need to be paid before he is deported. 

 

If he has not committed any other offences, he will be transported to the IDC in Bangkok to await deportation.  Transfer, as mentioned above, may take several days to arrange.

 

The police/immigration should notify the Consular Section of British Embassy in Bangkok that your son has been detained, where he is being held and the reason for the detention.  Unfortunately, this can often take several days to happen.  An Embassy representative will contact your son and inform him what assistance the Embassy can, or cannot, give.  See link below

 

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/451352/Thailand_Prisoners_pack_template_-_Final_Draft_for_publishing.pdf

 

Not wishing to frighten you, but the Immigration Detention Centre in Bangkok is everyone’s worst nightmare.  Conditions there are about as bad as they can get.  So, getting him out of IDC must be a number one priority.

 

I would strongly recommend that you contact the Consular Section at the British Embassy in Bangkok, their contact details are given in the link I’ve attached above and listen to their advice.  They deal with similar problems on a daily basis and are in the best position to give you advice. 

 

The Embassy will not pay for his flight out of the Kingdom.  However, you can send the Embassy money which they in turn will deposit in an account for him which will be held by the IDC.  The Embassy will make a charge for this service. 

 

Your son will not be allowed any personal possessions or physical money whilst in the IDC, but he can debit his account held by IDC in order to pay for better food, drinking water, mattress or other essentials etc. which he can request the guards to obtain for him.  He will also need funds available to pay for his flight out of the Kingdom.

 

Regarding his flight, again the Embassy staff will best advise you on this matter.  Generally speaking, Immigration will want the deportee to be flow back to their home country by a single carrier, without stops, whenever possible.  This should not be a problem as there are several carriers that fly direct between Bangkok and the UK.

 

I strongly advise that you, or his friends, do not purchase a ticket for him without talking to Immigration first as Immigration need to approve the flight before a booking is confirmed so that they can arrange transport from the IDC to the airport.  This can take a couple of days to arrange. 

 

It has been reported that when family or friends have obtained a ticket without Immigration approval the individual was not transported to the airport in time to catch the flight and as a result the airline considers it to be a ‘no show’, which means no refund and having to purchase another expensive ticket.

 

You need to be aware that a single ticket from Bangkok to the UK, booked at relatively short notice e.g. a couple of days, will be expensive – single fares tend to be 2/3rd the cost of a normal return flight and the short notice booking inevitably attracts a higher premium charge.

 

Once a flight has been approved and booked, Immigration will transport your son from the IDC in Bangkok to the airport.  At the airport your son will be taken to the airport detention facility until his flight is ready to board.  His passport will be given to the flight crew and this will be returned to him when he exits the plane in the UK.

 

For your information…  Your son will be banned from entering Thailand for the next 10 years.  This may present him with a problem if he has property and bank accounts here, but that is the least of his problems for now.  Get him out of IDC ASAP.

 

I hope this information has been helpful and best of luck.

Thankyou for your useful information, my son has now be held for 22 Days since his arrest, most of this I believe is because of Thai Holidays, he has now been held I IDC in Bangkok since 14 April, he has committed no other crime other than his overstay, (he was approached by 2 plain clothed police officers whine he was out, he was pointed out by an unknown female,) he has paid fine for this, I am in regular contact with embassy, they tell me that once he has been processed ie, blood test, finger prints etc, then flight can be arranged, (funds are in place) they also tell me that my son will be visited by them this week, they will have phone with them and he will be allowed to speak to me, this has been an absolute nightmare for us, and I dread to think what he may be going through.

I am a UK Resident who's son  was arrested yesterday 3/4 for overstaying visa, I have heard that overstay was approx. 4 years, I am trying to help to get him back home,  what does he face first, court appearance tomorrow