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I am British - male- 61 years old and was planning to travel to Singapore for a couple of weeks to meet up with a British friend who will be there then. I was going to travel down with his Thai girlfriend who is only 30 years old. I was told I may have problems doing this and a search on TV has shown that to be true.

I was planning to fly down there with her. I cannot imagine that I would fancy a long coach trip, but if I do still decide to make this trip with her, would it be better to take her through a land border rather than the airport?

Probably better if he comes to Thailand, but he won't be able to stay long due to work, so I would prefer it if we could go to Singapore - somewhere I have never been and I thought would be no problem at all to visit as Thais are allowed there without a visa.

Thanks for any advice you can offer.

Lite Beer and Nowretired - thanks for the quick reply. I thought that used to be the case, but so much seems to change!!

Thanks again

I have to go and pick up the extension at Jomtien after the 1 month consideration on the 3rd September. It would be difficult for my wife to go as well, I think I can pick this up on my own - is that correct?

Thanks for your help

I have to go and pick up the extension after the 1 month consideration on the 3rd September. It would be difficult for my wife to go as well, can I go and pick this up on my own?

Sutty, if you have fathered a child with your wife then you do not need a witness. I am not sure what proof is required though . Although it would seem logical that step children would count as 'your' children in the eyes of our friends at immigration, I do not know if that is the case. I am sure someone will come along to this thread soon who can help.

Siriam - it is a mystery indeed as to the thinking of an immigration officer both at different offices and even within the same office. It seems that interpreting the rules and regulations is some kind of art form, that can be interpreted as they see fit. Next year I think I will do the extension based on retirement - that is if the pound sterling exchange rate stays above 50. So much simpler for sure - well at the moment anyway!!

I went down there on Tuesday with my wife and no witness. The first thing the immigration officer asked us was if we had any children. We said no, but she seemed to just ignore the reply and processed all the paperwork as she did last year. Just before she handed us over to her superior officer next to her to do the final checks, she asked us again if we had children.

When we said 'no' again - she just ignored the reply again and handed the paperwork to the other officer who did the final checks and told me to come back in a month.

It could not have been easier.

In fact they seemed to spend more time making sure we understood and signed documents relating to the new overstay laws and agreeing to notify them of any changes in our marital circumstances.

So all done for another year - I wonder what intriguing new tests they will devise for next year's fun visa extension event.

Thanks for your help with this.

PatMalone, thanks for the feedback. I was interested to know if the service is still running and it obviously is. I am looking at various options and I am thinking of just hiring a car for 4 days so I can easily go and look at the sights as well - assuming the floods have gone by then that is.

Thanks again

I am flying from Bangkok to Udon Thani on the 20th of this month and coming back on the 23rd. I am visiting Bueng Kan and staying in THE ONE hotel.

Is this minivan still running this service Airport / NongKhai / Bueng Kan?

If so could someone please tell me how often it runs.

I expect to arrive in Udon Thani early morning at around 8am.

I am coming back on the Sunday 23rd for a flight at around 8pm.

Thanks very much for your help.

This is what I use:-

http://knd1.ilikehd.com/kaneda/web/login/index.php

DigitalBanana, Sumrit - you are right. I have found BTSport now in the package list. In fact it is shown in post 12 above in the second to bottom row. I got confused as it was shown separately in another view when I was logged on, this is just that though, another view of the channels and not directly related to the packages we can buy I guess.

OK, I have my 500 baht 'True money', so I am all ready to go. Thanks for the advice here and assistance - We have nearly a year of football to watch now with the Euros next year as well - fantastic!!!!

So I want to watch the Community Shield on Sunday. I have planned to get the Sports package for 250 Baht. I contacted the ILOVEHDTV to ask which of the many sports stations was showing this. I got a quick response saying it was on BTSports. So I looked at BTSports channel and it is not a part of the 'Sports' package - it is a part of the UK TV package!

Does this mean I would be better off getting the UKTV package as I suspect the Premier League games etc... will be shown on BTSports and the UKTV package has the other UK programmes as well?

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

personchester, I believe 365Sport is doing just that, but the special offer is only on the Premium 22 channels service.

bkkgooner, I assume you are an Arsenal fan - they played well against Lyon ! Champions performance if they could keep it up for the whole season. It will be interesting to see the Charity Shield on Sunday.

I had 365Sport for all of last season. As you say you can pay 600 baht a month and have it monthly.

Last year, I got a 6 month special offer deal for 1800 baht, so 300 baht a month.

I was quite happy with the service. I do not work so was able to get up and watch live games at 2am, 3am or whatever, so I did not use the catch-up option very often.

I did have some problems with matches not being on live on some occasions, due to a previous live event overrunning its time or loss of signal from the provider ie AstroSport.

I wonder if ILOVEHDTV has the same problems?

Anyway, at 250 baht a month for ILOVEHDTV for all those channels compared to 600 baht with 365Sport for their fewer channels, in the interest of encouraging competition I have today bought Truemoney tokens for 500 baht and will give it a go for 2 months. If it is no good then I can switch to 365Sport at any time - so nothing to lose.

MKAsok - Yes I suggested that to them. They were none too impressed - fair enough:-

Hi David,

You can access the content live and up to 5 days on demand.

The standard subscription is 3,300 THB for 6 months so for an extra 699 THB you will get over twice as many channels.

If you believe it's too expensive you are under no obligation to sign up.

Let us know if you would like us to place an order.

Kind regards,
Ben

So no confirmed promotion. I told them I would be using ILIKEHDTV and I thought they would be taking a lot of their custom as 250 baht is a good deal for the package offered.

Hi David,

We do not provide a football only subscription, future promotions have not been confirmed.

We have coverage of all the EPL games on our standard subscription. Most games are shown live with 1-2 games each week being shown the following day as a delayed broadcast.

The premium subscription will have additional broadcasts available.

The current promotion is on our new premium package which includes 22 channels for 3,999 THB for 6 months subscription.

The standard subscription is 3,300 THB for 6 months so for an extra 699 THB your get over twice as many channels.

Please let us know if you would like us to generate an invoice on your behalf.

This offer is only valid until 31.07.15.

Kind regards,
Ben

Lite Beer, thanks for the feedback on that. That is exactly the screen I was presented with when I went to check out the football options - wow - that is a lot of sport!

WitaWatWataWit, yes it is very confusing isn't it. That screenshot that Lite Beer posted is a good example of just how complicated it is. The provision of this kind of service over the internet is still new - only in the last few years has it been feasible with the faster links, so it will get better in the near future I am sure. 250 baht a month for all that content is very good though isn't it.

MKAsok - 365Sport contacted me again with that Premier deal I posted above. I asked them if they would be doing a special offer on the Standard Package as they did last year. I will post their reply here.

Lite Beer, that's a good deal then isn't it. I will give that a try when the footy starts next week (charity shield). I think it has some Championship games as well. I am a Forest fan, so got to see the odd Forest game on 365Sport

Cricket, I have no interest in cricket, I was just replying to a comment made by farmerjo who IS a keen cricket fan.

sumrit, thanks for that information - I will go and look at that site. I suppose 6000 baht for this next year is not bad really, as it will include the European Championships as well.

Digitalbanana, thanks, it looks like ILikeHDTV is well worth a look.

farmerjo, I hope you are Australian otherwise if you are English like me, you may be in for some depressing viewing:-)

Edit: I just subscribed to ILikeHDTV and it seems a really good package - the football and all the other stations for 250 baht a month. I have not taken out a package yet though. Does it show ALL the Premier matches???

farmerjo, I just looked at their website to see what their channels are and it seems to be all out of date - just 5 channels listed.

Where will you be watching the football - or is that not one of your sports you want to watch?

365 Sport sent me details of this offer. I am not interested as I only want to watch the Premier League and some Championship football and last year they offered TV forum members a 12 month deal 'standard' package for around 4000 baht.

Does anyone know if a similar offer is out there anywhere, as 365Sport seems to offer different deals to different web-sites and users.

Is there another online site that is similar to 365Sport that offers the football this year?

Thanks for your help.

(it says below I was a part of the free trial - I wasn't - but they say that is irrelevant to the offer)

The offer:-

Dear david ,

We hope that you have enjoyed your free trial of the brand new “Premium” package on 365 Sport TV.

To continue receiving all 22 channels once your trial has ended, you can now take advantage of our MEGA DEAL to get our fantastic PREMIUM PACKAGE for a whole 6 months for ONLY 3999THB - a generous 1600THB discount from the regular price.

NOTE: This is a limited period offer which ends midnight Friday 31st July 2015

If you have any questions or require assistance, please email us at [email protected]

Kind regards,
365 Sport TV Team

If I have to do the witness 'thing' then I won't bother with the extension based on marriage. I will change to the extension based on retirement. Ubonjoe above says I don't need to season the money if it is combined with a pension, so I will have time to do that and get away from this increasingly problematical extension based on marriage.

If I was in your shoes I'd take the easiest, most practical way out and not take these regulations so personally...

I would rather suck it up and get a witness than travelling to your Embassy in Bangkok and pay the exorbitant fee you guys are charged by your Embassy... and mess around with money transfers.

We already do a lot of sucking up to retire in Thailand, married or not - does doing it one more time really matter?

tropo, a man after my own heart. I tend to be good at ignoring mindless bureaucracy in LOS, or in the UK as well. Some of the hoops I had to jump through to get off the the UK tax list (HMRC) and even to open my last bank account in the UK, were much more of an effort than this latest immigration request. I just did those with the usual shrug of the shoulders.

This immigration request is different though. After 13 years of marriage, it requires me to involve other people in my immigration process - and people I know personally. I don't like that at all. It is none of their business.

For me personally as well, I have been considering switching to an extension based on retirement for several years now. With the pension letter, the amount I need to transfer is not a great deal more than the 400k baht needed for the marriage extension, so I could do this change this year if need be.

I will certainly do the retirement extension next year.

I don't need to go to the British Embassy, that letter proving my pension income is provided by EMS both ways at a cost of 2600 baht.

I would buy my friend's wife a gift costing at least 1000 baht for acting as a witness, so the extra cost is not that great:-)

roobaa01 photos with the witness - I missed that - what photos with the witness?

What I don't understand is how this scam can work for more than a year or 2 at most. People move to new locations and their 'wife' would want to move on, maybe get married for real. Ok, maybe this scam could work for longer than 2 years, but 13 years. Is it really necessary to sweep people like me up in this 'crackdown'.

Like I say, maybe I will be pleasantly surprised when I go to immigration on the 4th - maybe sense will prevail - I won't hold my breath though!

sandyf, it seems logical really doesn't it, that if you are looking for sham marriages, then the most likely group would be those of us without kids.

Maybe I am doing the Jomtien immigration a disservice by thinking that when I go there on 4th August, they won't have the sense to realise that a 61 year old Englishman that has been married to his Thai wife for 13 years, living at the same address and visiting the same immigration centre (including when it was in central Pattaya) during that time, may actually not need major investigation into the marriage being a sham!

We shall see.

As a backup, a friend of mine who has a Thai wife who has relatives in the police force (not immigration sadly), will be shopping at the South Pattaya (Soi Bukao) market on Tuesday the 4th and they have offered to come down to immigration if necessary to be a witness or whatever. It is not far away, so they could be there within 30 minutes.

So I am going to go there without a witness and if I cannot get the extension then I can call my friend to come and help if need be. or just leave and do the retirement extension instead.

I suppose some may wonder why I don't just take them down as a witness anyway, I think it is simply that I find this new rule so insulting, that changing to the retirement option would be preferable to jumping through this particular hoop.

Paz, I missed your question to me earlier about sham marriages. I have no idea where I got the notion this was about 'sham' marriages. I may have just (wrongly) made the jump from problems in my native England where sham marriages are a concern. What other reason is there for immigration to be doing this?

I mean, if this is not to spot sham marriages, then what IS it for?

Did I read in one of the posts here that I do not need those daft pictures of my wardrobe etc.. I have taken?

I must say, the retirement option is looking pretty good for next year, even if I 'tough it out' with this nonsense this year.

connda, I know how you feel.

I have never really bothered about the other (usually daft) changes they have made to this extension over the last 13 years. I have just done what they asked and shook my head quietly in disbelief.

However, this is different, as it means getting other people involved in the process and people that have to know me as well. No thanks.

Luckily I can revert to a retirement extension if need be and if I go 30 days before the current extension expires, then I will still have time to move money over from abroad and get the letter showing my pension income.

Ubonjoe gave me a link to the letter I would need to send to the British Embassy to prove my pension income and the '10 working days' in that letter and sending over the money from the UK would take no more than 20 days even in the worst case scenario I would think.

Thanks Mikebell for the reply.

I live North of Pattaya, so sadly I expect driving to that Fascino would take me quite some time allowing for all the traffic over that way now due to the underpass roadworks. Useful to know for the future though.